Are You Really Choosing Freedom?

                                                     

This is a con­tin­u­a­tion of  my last post, Choos­ing Free­dom,   Let’s take a closer look at the dynamic I referred to as “wag­ing the inner war” with one’s self.  

When I say I’m choos­ing free­dom, I’m declar­ing a peace treaty with myself.  No more inner wars, the bat­tle is over and I’ve won!  I’m free­ing myself from being locked in the past, being at war with what is, in the present.   Sounds good, huh?  

“Well, of course”, you say.  “Of course I choose free­dom!  Who, in their “right” mind wouldn’t?  Can you think of any­one who would pre­fer to be locked up, con­strained and bound, like slaves?  This seems like a no-brainer!  Why are we even hav­ing this con­ver­sa­tion?”

This may sound good and seem like a no-brainer, but I chal­lenge you to look in your own life (and me in mine) and not be able to find at least one or more places where you, in fact, are not free.  

Human beings talk a good game when we talk about per­sonal free­dom.  But at ground zero of your life, if you are rad­i­cally hon­est, you will most likely find sev­eral areas where you are liv­ing inside of beliefs that keep you enslaved to an old idea or pat­tern that restricts your freedom.

For exam­ple, take a look:  what are your com­pul­sions or obses­sions?  Where do you expe­ri­ence that you have no choice in your life?  Is it around food?  Work?  Look­ing good?  Being right?  Need­ing to be in con­trol?  What are you dri­ven to do and in fact, do it, some­times against your own sense of good judg­ment or well being?  Do you overeat?  Drink too much alco­hol?  Take too many drugs?  

Are you addicted to micro-managing every­thing or every one around you?  Are you super-careful, extremely cau­tious, never dar­ing to take any risks?  Where does your behav­ior veer towards the extremes of the con­tin­uum?  Look closely and you’ll find sev­eral areas that have hereto­fore been invis­i­ble to you.  

In my Life Fit­ness Coach­ing Boot Camp ses­sions, sev­eral par­tic­i­pants have real­ized they have no free­dom around their rela­tion­ship with food.  Their lives are dri­ven by being obsessed with eat­ing even when they’re not hun­gry, los­ing weight, wor­ry­ing about how their bod­ies look and feel­ing guilt and shame because they can’t get this part of their life under control.  

Other peo­ple rec­og­nize in them­selves an obses­sion around the need to look good, both phys­i­cally and/or related to what oth­ers may think of them.  While this is not a gen­der spe­cific issue, it’s a com­mon one in women.  Being con­sumed with wor­ry­ing about what oth­ers might think of you puts the brakes on self expres­sion.  You won’t do or say any­thing that could draw neg­a­tive atten­tion.  This is how we humans play the game.  And it’s also how we begin to learn to be inau­then­tic and dis­hon­est.  Not con­sciously.  Not like we mean to be dis­hon­est.  But at the core of what we call “rela­tion­ship”, is the need to please oth­ers and reign our­selves in in order to be liked.  And in the process, hon­esty gets white-washed in the name of “polit­i­cal cor­rect­ness” and we set­tle for a watered-down ver­sion of the truth.  It’s all around us.  It’s in the air we breathe.

The com­mon ele­ment in all such issues is the expe­ri­ence of hav­ing no choice in the mat­ter.  So look to see, where do you expe­ri­ence your free­dom to choose (fill in the blank) being con­strained?  What are the things you do, day in and day out, and you do them, not because you like to or want to, but because it feels like you have to?  And in the expe­ri­ence of hav­ing to, there is no choice?

Dig around here for awhile and come back.  We’re just get­ting started.

 

 

 

Tagged as: addictions, choice, dr. judith rich, Freedom, obsessions, Rx For The Soul