The Five Longings by David Richo

Author:David Richo
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Shambhala
Published: 2017-04-18T04:00:00+00:00

6

Our Longing for Freedom

Only by facing experiences directly can we become free of their domination. In this way, they no longer dictate who we are.

—EZRA BAYDA, Beyond Happiness

A longing is always for more than the ordinary. Thus, our longing for freedom is for wider and more personal liberties than we have in daily civic life. For instance, we long to be who we really are beyond what is approved by others. We want to be free of their power over us, to no longer let them have a say over how we live our lives.

We long for the freedom to be who we really are in thought, word, and deed. That does not seem like too much to ask. Yet, in our attitudes, choices, and lifestyle, we notice many ways in which it is not happening. So much of what seems to be ourselves has been inputted into us from our childhood, school, religion, society, or peers. What in me is actually I?

We notice how unsafe we often feel in showing—or even knowing—the many-splendored thing that is our true self. Deep within us is an enduring and poignant longing for the courage to be ourselves in all that we believe, do, feel, and are. Our longing for freedom depends for its fulfillment on our accessing that courage.

Freedom to be ourselves becomes a formidable challenge in some relationships. At times we can be caught in taxing adrenaline-driven dramas with others, especially in intimate relationships or within family. We are only free to be ourselves when we are no longer obsessed, addictively attached, or holding onto expectations of or judgments about others. In fact, precisely what we let go of in mindfulness meditation is what helps us find personal freedom: judgment, fear, craving, blame, shame, or attachment to an outcome. In mindful awareness, we are no longer designing our lives on the basis of what others may have come to mean, do, or be in our minds. The result is the freedom to stand firmly on the earth as who we really are. Our hearts have always longed for that groundedness. Sadly, in emotional turmoil with others it is hard to take notice of what our hearts are asking, let alone say yes.

Freedom cannot be defined as limited to any one state of being. Thus, for instance, freedom is not necessarily found either in independence from others or in closeness to them. Freedom is not synonymous either with commitment or no commitment. Freedom is unconditioned. As a state of being, it can exist in any circumstance. We can be unfree on the street or free in a prison. We see this option described so charmingly in the poem “To Althea, from Prison” by the seventeenth-century poet Richard Lovelace:

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