For nothing left to lose. That was my mantra for life. When I was young, it meant way open vistas of life unlived, people I hadn’t yet met and loved, and places still to be seen and experienced. Freedom was all that and the knowledge that I had years to do it all. But with this view from the other side of sixty, freedom has new meaning for me and not all of it positive.
How do you define your freedom? What does freedom mean to you as you age? Do you feel more restricted and less free than in your younger years?
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wow what an interesting question. I know approx. what I want to say but will come back to you later today.
It’s all about inner freedom.
I think when I was younger I mistook freedom for infinite possibility. I didn’t realize that true freedom comes within commitment and responsibility, and that infinite possibility means nothing until one makes a choice.
Freedom from not having to be concerned about the implications of a million other choices is what I’m talking about; freedom to concentrate on exactly what you determine is of highest personal significance, and letting all the rest go.
That is my idea of freedom, and that’s what I treasure about reaching this age.
Freedom for me, and it’s taken a long time to define it in my life, means not being afraid to do the things you really want to do. It’s about putting yourself first – to thine own self be true. For so many years as a mother, business woman and wife, which I have loved and am still doing, but with a new sense of priorities. I’m learning that it’s ok to step away from micro managing everything and move into my own life. To not fear the unknown and forge ahead with new thoughts, wants, and expectations is so liberating. Everyone around me is more relaxed too!
Great question. I agree with you and Sea Writer. Freedom meant infinite possiblities with a sense of wonder. As I age though and have more and more family members struggling with or who have struggled with Alzheimer’s, my lifestyle of freedom gives me pause. How long will I be able to keep it up, and will I consciously know when I’m no longer able to live free …and safe?
Great question. Freedom for me, in my 20′s was getting away from under my mother’s thumb. I love her but she’s a very controlling person and I always wanted and tried to please her. Of course I married a controling husband! I stayed with him for 24 1/2 years before I took control of my life. I went back to school and finished my education and took computer courses. Having my own apartment, controling my own money, making my own decisions, that (for me was freedom). I remarried a few years ago and this time not to a controller, moved away and have enjoyed the freedom to be me. I guess when I stopped trying to please everybody else and began living my own life, in the way I choose, making my own decisions, that is freedom to me.
Freedom for me now is saying “no” and not saying yes when i really was not in agreement to some of life’s situations.
Oh how arrogant is youth! Freedom was all about me.
Freedom means the ability to do the many things I want to do. And with an aging body and active mind it is hard to see why I can’t always accomplish more in the day.
I still have the freedom to be me. And age has allowed that to be more true than ever. Without the trappings of ‘whats expected of me’ attached, I am free to be me in a whole new perspective. Age has its benefits.
God bless, J
freedom is something you have to work everyday of your life, have you read Erick Fromm about the fear of freedom,
I define my spiritual freedom by a constant flow of acceptance toward myself. This includes the integration of my shortcomings and the shadowy aspects of myself. Spiritual freedom is becoming and utimately requires a great deal of responsibility.
As I age the hunger for this intangible is one of the key covenants I have made with myself. Freedom, especially spiritual freedom has shifted from an outward experience to an inward knowledge.
I was a care free child of the 1960′s. I was free-dumb. As I age there are restrictions on my external behavior and I have come to accept these limitations. Often kicking and screaming. However, with the exception of an organic disease there is no restriction on my consciousness and I can go as deep as I choose. I can excavate this treasure until the day I die.
Thank you for allowing me to ponder these thoughtful and deeply moving questions.
Sharon Duncan
Sharon, you have found the secret passage to the mother lode of aging – the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow – discovering your inner self and “following your bliss”. This is the core of our being that is like a mystery box most of us do not discover until we shift our attention from worldly values and distractions to our authentic spiritual selves, our inward knowledge, as you say. As we open this mystery box, the sense of freedom that accompanies this shift in our awareness is an awesome surprise, along with all the other spiritual surprises that are revealed to us. Well worth the wait, but better sooner than later! It only gets better!
I’m a little late responding because I just joined Vibrant Nation. But I agree with you wholeheartedly. For the past few years I have been shedding my past, going against the grain, defying traditions, institutions and relationships that have held me bound for years. And, in the process, I have re-discovered and re-defined myself. And, you know what? I like me!! As I reflect on these things, I realize that at this point in my life I’m happy, free and at peace with myself and with God. I have learned to treasure peace–peace within and peace with God. And I’m learning how to walk away from people and circumstances that disturb that peace. I’m a baby-boomer also. It’s a beautiful age–challenging but beautiful. The hardest thing about this new freedom is that I find that I’m having to leave behind a few friends and many acquaintances that have not reached this point of self-realization.
Deborah Hardy
Hi Eileen, an interesting topic, and some wonderful thoughts and responses.
I have always waited for the time when I could be free. Free of — you name it. Free to do this or that. And I thought of all the reasons I couldn’t. And so I forged my chains.
It came to me last month and was a joyful epithany at 52 — I’ve always been free. I just didn’t know it. Free to think as I want. Free to let my mind wander as it will. Free to do whatever I want, and to live wherever I wanted, although I didn’t know it. Free to chose. Free to work with the consequences of choice. Free to take responsibility. Free to not. Free to move. Free to do. Blessedly free to move around on two legs, to drive, to see (despite the 20/275
, to hear, to smell, to taste, to enjoy my senses. Free to enjoy what I was given.
What has made me not free is the “shoulds”, the “I don’t thinks”, the self-limiting. The self-limiting by choices. The allowing of other people’s opinions, ideas, controlling, whatever limit me. The thinking I couldn’t be free. (And, through a bit of self analysis, it lead back to childhood.) Yes, the infinite possibily of youth was blissful. The choices were self-limiting. And have been since.
I think we are as free as we choose to be. Perhaps freedom is in part an acknowlegement of our freedom to choose. It is also a taking of the responsibility for our part in what happens in our lives. Perhaps we are as free as we think we are. Sure, this year for me personally there’s the layoff, the resultant money issue and big career question, the move, the question of whether the Lyme Disease is lingering — whatever. There’s always something. But today I’m happy to be free in knowing I have so many wonderful choices. My personal spiritual belief is that I’m (beginning to understand) opening to drawing my highest good, perhaps purpose from the universe. So! Just my opinion. But maybe this will strike a chord for someone passing by and reading.
Hi, Texasrose: How beautifully said! It is a much broader observation of freedom than my comments to Sharon reviously. Thanks fo your wods of wisdom. It should be very enlightening to many of us.
Hi LadyB, thanks! Your analogy of the mystery box is wonderful. We can all relate to opening a mystery box, and the excitement!
It is like a sideways shift, and it suddenly presents a vista seen with new eyes. I just realized: I hadn’t experienced a paradigm shift since I was a child, looking at a prism on the Christmas tree, and realizing that every individual looks at the world through a different side of the prism — the same view, but different angles and realities. That’s a long time to wait for new wisdom; I’ll try more often!
Interestingly enough, I first heard this described as a shift two nights ago in a movie lecture by Dr. Wayne Dyer. The lecture shows again Feb 4 all over the US. I highly recommend it. DrWayneDyerCinema.com will get anyone there who’s interested.