Oh hey guys, remember how I used to post things that weren't school related? Lies. Now I can only write trippy essays that have everything and nothing to do with Modernism. Here is my latest "short" (aka miniscule) essay: some tripping on freedom.
I may have been free all of my life, yet I can only see myself in captivity. What is freedom in the end? Not a soul on this earth may be truly free, for they will always see themselves in the cage of someone else. One may suggest that I was free when I pulled on the coat that I decided to wear today, and yet it was not entirely my decision. My father paid for the coat, therefore it is his. My mother likes the coat, therefore it is hers. The weather is cold today, requiring me to wear the coat, therefore the coat belongs to the weather as well. Finally the decision I made in putting my arms through the sleeves of said coat was only fractionally my choice, only in part a decision made by me—and therefore how can I be free?
Yet, there may have been one time in my life when I was free; a time when the decision I made was influenced by my thoughts, and only mine. There may have been a decision I have made in my life that was completely mine, belonging to me and nobody else. When was this time that I was free? Certainly not now, when my life’s every movement is determined by the forces and wills of my parents, my teachers, whatever colleges I may be applying to. Even this, what college I will go to, is not determined by me, when in reality it should be entirely my choice, for it is I who will go there. And yet, I must consider where my parents want me to go, I must consider which colleges will accept me, and I must consider above all else, what people will think of me. A constant consideration in every decision I make—what will everyone else say?
This suggests that perhaps the only time I did not worry about this was when I was only a child, who knew nothing of the world, and nothing of the thoughts of others. There is only one time in one’s life when one is truly free, and that is when one has just entered into life, into being—this is the only freedom I know of. When I opened my eyes into the bright lights of a universe tangential to what I had known previously, and yet somehow completely different, then I may have been free.
When I was brought into the world by a nurse in a hospital, somewhere on the earth, in the moment just after I entered consciousness and the moment just before I was placed into the arms of my mother, I was free. For just before this, I was in the captivity of another being who was feeding me, allowing me to live, in fact granting life to me, and as soon as I was put into my mother’s arms, I was entirely dependent on her. I was dependent for food, for water, for anything that was not immediately on my being. But in that exact moment between the two, I belonged to no one but myself, I knew of nothing but myself, and that was freedom enough for me.
A/N: Unsure what to think of this essay (WOAH, THAT'S NEW!). Thoughts? Good? Bad? Disgusting? Offensive? You don't care? Too bad, leave a comment anyway.
