Finding Freedom
I’ve been ruminating lately about the concept of freedom. As someone who lives with anxiety, I often feel trapped within my own mind and my own fears. And when I’m not imprisoning myself, I feel bordered in by the weight of social norms and others expectations. And I know that this isn’t just my reality. It’s a reality for many of you too which brings me back to my pondering about freedom. Can you think of a time in your life when you felt completely and utterly free? I would genuinely love to hear about your experience of freedom if you’d be willing to share it with me.
The most clear picture in my head of the deepest freedom I’ve experienced was when I was in university. My boyfriend at the time and I went to a concert of a band we both loved. It was a smaller venue in Toronto. We knew exactly nobody else there. But something about the combination of being there with someone I loved who also loved me, the anonymity I had in the crowd, and the pulse of the music, allowed me to dance truly like I never had before. My thoughts seized to exist. I had no fears. I wasn’t worried about how I appeared to others. I just felt the music and moved. It is the clearest moment of freedom in my memory.
I’ve been thinking a lot about that moment and about how much I long to exist in that space…not just once in awhile but all the time. I long to have that freedom from expectation and social pressure and to just feel at peace with myself and to move through life in that headspace. And I don’t just want that for me, I want it for every one of you. I so desire to see a world where everyone exists as their deepest, truest, weirdest self, free of what the world has taught them they “should” be, free of fear, just honestly and authentically showing up. And I wish I was writing this because I have it all figured out. I don’t. The first step to building a bridge, though, isn’t to create it, it’s to recognize the need for it.
When I look at the people around me, I so often feel like I see beneath the surface, beneath the face they’ve been taught to project to the world. I often feel like I know people better than I actually do because I feel connected to the feelings I see tucked in the corners of their eyes, or the hint of hurt I can see behind their shiny smiles. I’ve always hated small talk because I’d rather learn about who you are. I want to know what lights you up, what makes joy spread throughout your body like the warmth of liquor. I want to know how you’ve been hurt, so I have a better idea how you need to be loved. All this to say, I see too many of your beautiful souls trapped and I long with a fiery passion to see them set free. I recognize the need for a bridge into freedom because I feel the pain of too much beauty tucked away into boxes. I see too many bright colours forced to paint in black or white. I want a world without boxes where all of the colours mingle and dance in the full glory of their own light.
So I keep asking myself, how it can be done. How can we achieve the dream of existing in our freedom? I honestly don’t have an answer. But I think a big part of it is to come back to ourselves. It’s to pay attention to those tiny sparks of joy that we feel at our core and to do more of what ignites them. It’s to do small scary things – show off your beach bod, dance or sing when that song comes on – even in public, smile at that stranger, share an honest answer to the “how are you?”, try the thing that you’ve always wanted to do, let someone in. Find someone you love, who also loves you, feel the pulse of the music, and dance in your uninhibited glorious light until you’ve found yourself free.
And if you have some other ideas or want to share your freedom memory, leave a comment or shoot me a message, I’m here and I truly would love to hear from your beautiful soul.