Freedom is the Celebration

Many are independent -- but very few are free.  Actually, most people in "retirement," are independent, but very few think they are free -- or act like it.  Freedom is the realization that everything is a choice -- born of decision and no longer the compulsion to do anything as they've always done it before, or even think that it could be any different.  

And that is the beauty of freedom -- to be what one imagines they could be -- not only in their minds but in the actuality -- which is reality.  That's how it comes about -- but not if one insists that only what one has always done before, is reality, and everything else merely wishful-thinking.  Each are equally plausible; it depends upon the commitment and investment in each reality.

If it works, then one should continue doing so -- but if it is not working, one must do something different -- and not just the same thing, hoping for a different result.  That won't change anything -- and what is needed is change.  Change makes all things possible -- because it produces a different result, even if at first, it is not exactly the desired result.  One knows then, whether one is closer or farther, to reaching their desired outcome -- rather than just the predictable same ol' thing.

And thus one learns one thing -- and then another -- but it is a different thing, and not merely confirming the futility and despair in thought and action.  Then one is a slave to tradition and convention -- and not free to find out what lies beyond.  It is the finding out -- for oneself that distinguishes the authentic from the pretension.  The pretentious have no idea what is real; they only pretend to know -- thinking that it is the same, but fails them in critical moments, when they absolutely have to know the difference. 

That is the freedom to find out the truth of the matter -- and not just repeat the truth somebody told them -- as though they thought of it themselves.  But such people have no idea how to think for themselves -- because they only know what they've been taught is the truth -- as though it is the same thing, which it seldom is.  To believe they are, is the reason for futility and despair -- without the hope of ever finding out.

That is why freedom is always a celebration -- of one's ability to find out the limits of their being and doing -- and not as the fearful think, that it is a freedom from those challenges.  The greatest gain, is the loss of that fear.  Then one becomes fearless -- and therefore free, but not before.