Free is one of those words everybody salutes and nobody can define. Listen:
The only way to deal with an unfree world is to become so absolutely free that your very existence is an act of rebellion – Camus
It is difficult to free fools from the chains they revere – Voltaire
Freedom is never voluntarily given by the oppressor; it must be demanded by the oppressed. – Martin Luther King, Jr.
To be free is not merely to cast off one’s chains, but to live in a way that respects and enhances the freedom of others. -- Mandela
Freedom consists not in doing what we like, but in having the right to do what we ought. – John Paul II
A hero is someone who understands the responsibility that comes with his freedom. – Bob Dylan
Freedom is the right to tell people what they do not want to hear. – Orwell
Freedom is what you do with what’s been done to you. – Sartre
Necessity is blind until it becomes conscious. Freedom is the consciousness of necessity. – Marx
People demand freedom of speech as a compensation for the freedom of thought which they seldom use. – Kierkegaard
I only ask to be free. The butterflies are free. -- Dickens
Memorable sentiments all – but compatible? Does the enchained slave want to be free as a butterfly, to obey the laws of nature – or as saint, to obey the law of God – or as a responsible citizen, respecting the rights of others – or as an individual, free to think his own thoughts... Freedom from or freedom to? Shackled – by responsibility – or released – to do our own thing? And what is my thing? I’m free to outwrite Shakespeare, right? – nobody’s stopping me – I’d be happy to – but don’t hold your breath. And was Shakespeare free – now you mention it – to be anybody but Shakespeare? What if Shakespeare wanted to be me!
Etymology hardly clarifies. The word’s ancient root signified possession: mine, not yours. From that seed, the idea of beauty sprouted in one direction and of necessity in another: either of those is mine, not yours. I am free to write what I please, but not what I can’t. Am I free not to write? (I would be, were I anybody else, only I’m stuck being me.)
Freedom, like luck, is a thought not a thing: one person’s freedom is another’s servitude. It is so if we think so, and not if we don’t. Mugged by depression, I was not free, believe you me, but I was still free – to jump.
If freedom is an idea, our way there is by thinking. To change your condition, change your mind. The Stoics taught this: we can be prisoners only with our permission. A thug can lock my body in jail, but my thoughts?
I revel in as much freedom as I can manage. More would be less. To keep my mind free to frolic, I restrict my heft to a routine, donning my habit as strictly as a monk. I try to do the same day after day robotically to spare my mind occupation by nonsense. I loathe wasting thought on what to wear or what hours to eat, so I don’t. I shudder at that cheery phrase “for a change of pace.” I prefer this pace, thanks, and shut the door on your way out. I’m freest at night in the cell of silence.
Retirement from my job freed me – to indenture by a dream. Now I had no excuses. I had to be the most I could be or to hell with me. Judge me freedom’s slave.