“Freedom´s just another word for nothing left to lose“ - from the song Me and Bobby McGee.
„Freiheit ist immer die Freiheit des Andersdenkenden“ - Rosa Luxemburg
(translated on wikiquote as
“Freedom is always the freedom of dissenters“ )
Source:
https://www.change.org/p/fran%C3%A7ois-hollande-france-take-back-the-statue-of-liberty
“Freedom is the opportunity to live your life as you want to live it“
Harry Brown in his book - How I found freedom in an unfree world.
“This country was founded by slave owners who wanted to be free.“ George Carlin on the USA
After 9/11 one of America´s greatest philosophical thinkers, George W. Bush, found the answer as to why guys crash planes into buildings. “They hate us for our freedom.“
And in a heroic attempt to reduce hate, he started to reduce freedom by signing the PATRIOT Act into law. And the "Land of the free“ became the “Land of the used to be free“.
There are also different degrees of freedom for different people.
The richer you are, the more free you are, because you got more choices.
“Money won´t buy you happiness, but it surely let´s you chose your own form of misery.“ Groucho Marx
Financial freedom:
How long can you maintain your current standard of living without having to work for your living expenses? One month? One year? For the rest of your live?
Or are you even enslaved by your credit card debts, because you bought too much stuff you don´t need with money you didn´t have to impress people you don´t like?
Viktor Frankl says
“Between stimulus and reaction, human beings do have the freedom of choice.“
He found out in the most unfree environment imaginable, a Nazi concentration camp.
He realized that the Nazis could do whatever they wanted with his body, since his body was not free, but he could control his own reactions to whatever happened.
He envisioned himself, being back at university, giving lectures again to his psychology students. And that´s exactly what happened later on, because he survived.
The freedom of the mind.
Roberto Benigni, director of “Life is beautiful“, once got verbally attacked during a press conference by some journalist who accused him of making fun of the Holocaust.
What the journalist did not understand is that this movie is a celebration of that freedom of the mind, Frankl was talking about. Although in the movie the father gets shot in the end, (and I was very disappointed and also shocked by this ending, I would have much prefered a Hollywood ending in that case, but this shows that Benigni actually did not take the topic lightly) he succeeded with his plan to protect his son by pretending it´s all a game.
Triumph of the Will!
Unfortunately neuro sciences have been telling us for quite a while now that there is no free will, that the will can only want what the brain has already decided a split second before.
In the Samadhi Hall of the Sivananda Ashram in Rishikesh there are many paintings,
depicting scenes from Swami Sivananda´s life.
My favorite is one of him sitting on a rock by the Ganga and the caption says
“A saint is the greatest hero, for he alone has broken the unbreakable chains of karma.“
“There is no such thing as sin.
The baby soul simply must commit some mistakes on its way to liberation.“
Take that, all you propagators of purgatory!
“I am not so much concerned with freedom of religion but with freedom from religion“ George Carlin
Don´t get me started on religion. Religion and government, the biggest enslavers of mankind.
“There is no point in finding the clitoris, if you find it with an uppercut.“ - Frankie Boyle
(What the freedom)
And since life would be nothing without a song and a dance let´s end this with one
And while your here, please check out this other great content on the ecoTrain. 😘
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