“Freedom” may not be what you think
Freedom is having choices
by Paul Kearley
This morning, while reading Richard Rohr’s Everything Belongs, my mind drifted to a question that caught me completely by surprise…
Am I really free?
Not politically.
Not financially.
But deeply.
Am I free to live the life I was created to live?
Am I free to love without fear?
Am I free to forgive?
Am I free to say no?
Am I free to become who I really am?
The more I thought about it, the more I realized that most of us define freedom by our options.
Freedom is having choices.
Freedom is doing what we want.
Freedom is saying whatever we think.
Freedom is living without restrictions.
Then Rohr stopped me in my tracks.
He writes that our Western understanding of freedom is really only secondary freedom—the freedom to choose between options. Valuable? Certainly. But not the deepest kind of freedom.
He describes primal freedom as the freedom to be the self despite circumstances.
That sentence sat with me for a long time.
Imagine that.
Not needing perfect health before you can have joy.
Not needing everyone to approve of you before you have confidence.
Not needing life to cooperate before you experience peace.
That is a very different definition of freedom.
As I reflected on it, I thought about people I’ve admired throughout my life.
Some had very little money.
Some faced enormous challenges.
Some battled illness.
Some carried heartbreak.
Yet they possessed something that couldn’t be taken away.
They were free.
Not because life was easy.
Because life no longer owned them.
Rohr points out that saints could be imprisoned without losing their souls. They could be persecuted without losing their joy. Their circumstances changed, but their identity didn’t.
That’s freedom.
The irony is that many of us spend our lives trying to control everything around us.
We want the perfect job.
The perfect relationships.
The perfect health.
The perfect future.
And while we’re busy trying to control life, life quietly begins controlling us.
Our fears become our prison.
Our need for approval becomes our prison.
Our expectations become our prison.
Even our successes can become our prison.
Perhaps the greatest prison is the one we build inside ourselves.
Rohr suggests that contemplative prayer slowly exposes this. When we become still, we begin to notice how much of our mental energy is spent replaying conversations, defending ourselves, imagining arguments, worrying about tomorrow, or trying to solve problems that don’t yet exist.
I’ve discovered that myself.
Sometimes I sit quietly, and within seconds my mind starts writing tomorrow’s script.
What needs fixing?
Who needs calling?
What if this happens?
What if it doesn’t?
Very little of it has anything to do with this present moment.
Maybe freedom begins there.
Maybe freedom isn’t escaping life.
Maybe freedom is finally being present enough to experience it.
For me, living with Parkinson’s has made this question even more personal.
There are things I cannot control.
There are abilities that may change.
There are uncertainties ahead.
But those realities don’t get to decide whether I can still encourage someone.
They don’t determine whether I can still love my wife.
They don’t stop me from laughing with my grandchildren.
They don’t prevent me from creating, teaching, writing, or making a knife in my shop.
Those things remind me that my deepest freedom doesn’t depend on perfect circumstances.
It depends on remembering who I am.
Perhaps that is what Jesus meant when He said, “The truth will set you free.”
Truth isn’t merely information.
Truth is identity.
It is living from the person God created us to be instead of the person fear tells us we are.
Today I’m asking myself a different question.
Not…
“What freedoms do I have?”
But…
“What still owns me?”
Because every fear released…
Every grudge forgiven…
Every expectation surrendered…
Every anxious thought laid down…
Makes room for something far greater.
The freedom to simply be.
And perhaps that is the greatest freedom of all.
