Read on to find your own path to personal freedom
Recovering from recent emergency surgery to repair a torn retina, I am reminded once again of the fragility and contingency of our lives. I had been in New York City, having dinner with old friends. We were enjoying a restaurant […]
The mythology of enlightenment follows a well-known script: our hero, usually jaded from wasting their time in frivolous pursuits, realizes that there must be a path to a better, more fulfilled life and so embarks on a long and arduous […]
Freedom is a worthy goal: the slave-turned-philosopher Epictetus said it was in fact the highest virtue, and over the course of human history many millions have perished seeking it, attaining it, or defending it. But, if you’re lucky enough to […]
We all spend way too much time on zoom these days. All that time spent staring at a small screen, with small images of other people doing the same thing, talking about very specific issues, can produce tunnel-vision and tunnel-thinking: […]
Guest post by Chris Folland (https://www.linkedin.com/in/chris-folland-5b3b9814/) Here’s a life question for you: Do you want to do what you want, when you want, with whom you want… for as long as you want? That’s an interesting question, which is often […]
Intellectual humility as a virtue has taken a real beating lately: our bruising political “discourse,” rancorous media punditry, and social media echo chambers all seem to celebrate, encourage, and reward staking out a position and sticking to it with ferocious […]
“Freedom” is a beguiling concept that has bewitched philosophers, theologians, writers, politicians, entrepreneurs,and psychologists for thousands of years. Why do we yearn for it? Do most of us even know what it means? Before we even talk about “declaring our freedom” we should get a decent handle on what “freedom” itself is and how it can be achieved.
At first blush, freedom seems pretty simple: the ability to think and act without constraint, either external or internal. The extent to which any one of us, individually, has personal freedom, is the extent to which we are free to think the thoughts we wish to think, and to act the way we’d like to act, without other people, organizations, or circumstances limiting those thoughts or actions – and with no internal constraints on our thoughts or actions imposed by our own beliefs, desires, or fears.
