These days in most parts of the world we get to enjoy freedom, at least in those parts where this article might be read.
Of course there are still too many places, where people are truely subdued, no matter if it is by criminals or unlawful regimes, through state terror, censorship or fear. We read about girls being shot for wanting to go to school, people disappearing for critizing the regime and police beating up suspects until they confess to crimes they haven't committed just to stop the torture.
While to most of us this sounds like something from a far away past or far away lands, the reality it that there are many places where this is still happening every day and even in Europe or the US this was barely 1 or 2 generations ago or even less.
This is tragic and horrible and needs to stop now! But this is not what I want to talk about today. Today I want to talk about the freedom we enjoy in what I will call "the western world". Are we enjoying true freedom or is this merely an ilusion?
Most of us are at liberty to choose whom to marry, what job to do and where to live. We can speak our mind without having to fear for our lives and we can trust that the police are truely here to serve and protect. In those aspects we are enjoying freedom. I believe however that with these freedoms we have put ourselves in a different cage, one that most of us aren't even aware of.
The freedom gave us the chance to live a comfortable life, which most of us do but this has led us to value the wrong things. We fear trivial things like our new car being scratched of stolen, we fear not passing our evaluation with our boss and similar things. Therefore we might take the bus instead of our new car or we work unneccessary extra hours instead of watching our daughter's dance recital. We put ourselves in this cage, as if the job or car were the most important things in the world. But are they?
Can't we bring the car to a workshop if is scratched? Can't we find a new job if things came down to us being fired? But our daughter's dance recital will never come back. She will never again be that cute in her ballet outfit and never have the chance to be proud for having danced faultless in front of her parents at the age of 5!
So why do we do this to ourselves? Because with living a comfortable life comes the fear of loosing it. Most of us are so focused on maintaining this comfortable life that we forget to actually live it. All too often people work overly hard during their life that shortly before retirement they have a stroke or a heart attack. Wouldn't it be more sensible to live in the now than always planning for a future that might not come?
Of course we need to be able to provide for our families but there is a line between providing and overdoing it. I am certain that if you ask a five year old if she preferred her father coming to the dance recital over the expensive sneakers, she would always choose her father.
I think what everybody has to ask themselves, whether the next promotion is more important than the people in our life or if the risk of loosing money isn't worth it to try to fullfill lifelong dreams. Because only if we escape the prison of our own fears and doubts and can we truely be free.
