What if Freedom Is an Inside Job?

Stepping out of pressure, reaction, and inherited expectations

Author: Esther Sarlo, BA | Founder and Visionary ~ Mynd Myself

The idea of freedom is constantly being discussed. We fight about it. We demand it. We defend it. We fear losing it.

Yet I wonder if we’ve stopped lately to ask a deeper question: What IS freedom, really?

Through the ages, freedom has meant many different things, depending on the context.

Freedom from slavery.
Freedom from an abusive home or work situation.
Freedom from oppressive religious edicts and mandates.
Freedom from government overreach.
Freedom from societal or familial expectations or demands.
Freedom to pursue purpose and calling vs. obligation and duty.
Freedom to choose autonomy and authority, no matter the circumstances.

One Perspective

I can only write from a place of subjective personal experience—and from observations and learnings I’ve gleaned from others along the way. I am definitely NOT writing about this topic from a position of ‘having all the answers.’

I have lived a life of great privilege. For much of it, I had no idea. I never had to worry about my family’s or my safety. It was not even on our radar that someone could come to our door in the middle of the night to steal from us, do us harm, or kill us. Clean water (both hot and cold) were readily available from our taps. Electricity was ever-present and reliable. I didn’t have to think about my next meal—whether or not there might be one. And although I had to deal with being bullied and ridiculed for much of my elementary and high school years, I never knew a fear of being prevented from attending school…or maybe being attacked on the journey to of from classes.

I was raised in an era where children walked to school on their own—sans parental supervision. There was no one telling me that I couldn’t or shouldn’t be educated based on my gender. In my family, education was taken for granted—not encouraged per se, but just ‘there.’

Freedom…or Not…Around the World

I’m sure you’re aware that in many places throughout the world, this is not the case. Oppression reigns as the dominant and prevailing energy of the cultural norms. Girls are treated more like chattel than beings with souls, value, and choice. People are forbidden from expressing their thoughts and opinions freely. Music is banned. Clean water, fresh air, and nutritious food are NOT a given. And certainly the pursuit of meaningful work is so far off the beaten path of surviving through another day that the idea of ‘fulfillment’ must feel like an alternate universe.

As I have been pondering this topic of freedom over the last five years, in particular, I have been challenged to examine what I thought I knew. What I assumed was truth. What I had simply neglected to consider…from my place of privilege.

Penetrating the Bubble

Despite my values of kindness, authenticity, integrity, and open-heartedness, I had largely been coasting along the waves of life in my own insular fashion, with what I thought was an informed open mind. Over the decades, arrows of challenge did pierce my complacency though. A few of which are:

Jackie Pullinger, who founded the St. Stephens Society in Hong Kong which provided rehabilitation homes for recovering drug addicts, sex workers, and gang members.
Spending time with some of the people who lived in Vancouver’s Downtown Eastside.
Being a Youth and Family Counsellor to at-risk youth and teenagers for over ten years in Vancouver.
Hearing lived stories from others around the world and the conditions from which they’d fled.
Reading books and watching documentaries that graphically portrayed real oppression.

Then, as the COVID-19 pandemic began to play out, things that had been set in motion years earlier (if not decades, or more), started coming to light. And no, I’m not going to spend any more time or space here on that topic. Whatever your perspective and experience, I don’t need to add more to that conversation at this juncture.

Today

Regardless of where you land politically, medically, spiritually, or culturally, many people seem to be experiencing a growing sense of pressure, uncertainty, and limitation. There is an undercurrent of restriction and control that have been becoming more and more evident and overt everywhere we turn.

Skyrocketing food prices.
Banking and financial constraints thrust upon us.
Privacy becoming a myth of the past.
Real Estate instability.
Draconian edicts from institutions and groups that have been purported to have our best interests at heart.
Medical blind eyes turned toward root-cause solutions in favour of mere symptom management…(and let’s not get into known and stated side-effects.)
The legal game that, again, claims to be set up for our ‘good,’ but is largely skewed toward benefitting the wealthy, large corporations, and systemic institutional powers.

I could go on. The list is long. But you get the point.

So, in these times of chaos, division, disenfranchisement, and sometimes outright antagonism and animosity, what IS FREEDOM? What does freedom really mean today?

Exploring Man’s Search for Meaning

I believe one of the most profound treatises on this topic is found in Victor Frankl’s book, Man’s Search for Meaning. As a successful neurologist and psychiatrist, Frankl had written a book on this topic only to find himself imprisoned during WWII and his manuscript burned in front of him. His book was about the ultimate human freedom—spiritual and internal freedom. Frankl had argued that while physical liberty can be taken away, we retain the freedom to choose our own attitude and response to suffering. No matter the circumstances, he posited that we have the conscious power to decide how our circumstances affect us.

Put to the test in unbelievably extreme and horrific conditions, Frankl shared his observations of people who walked through the concentration camp huts comforting others and giving away their last pieces of bread. Everyone was in the same unbearable situation: cruelty, abuse, starvation rations, and extreme oppression on every level. How did some choose to continue to act with dignity, love, and purpose…even in these appalling conditions? Even while being pushed to the limits of physical, mental, and emotional endurance?

Well, sometimes suffering is unavoidable. But our power lies in choosing our response to it.

Does this mean it is always easy?

No. Definitely not.

The more I reflect on Frankl’s observations, the more I realize that freedom is about more than choosing how we respond to our circumstances. It’s about remembering who we are when circumstances try to convince us otherwise. It invites a deeper question:

Who are we beneath the fear, anger, grief, frustration, and uncertainty of the moment?

Are we reacting from fear, resentment, hurt, and helplessness? Or are we responding from a deeper place of awareness, responsibility, and intention?

Our Freedom…and Our Responsibility

Will we remember who we really are?

Will we acknowledge our genuine anger, grief, hurt…and still choose to move back above the line? (See David R Hawkins’ Map of Consciousness in his book, Power Vs. Force for more about this.)

Will we choose to see and find purpose and meaning…regardless of our circumstances?

Will we balance freedom and responsibility, as Frankl also said?

“Freedom […] is not the last word. Freedom is only part of the story and half of the truth. Freedom is but the negative aspect of the whole phenomenon whose positive aspect is responsibleness. In fact, [freedom] is in danger of degenerating into mere arbitrariness unless it is lived in terms of responsibleness.”

As I’ve been studying and immersing myself in the Map of Consciousness paradigm, learning more and more about what it means to choose my internal state—regardless of what’s happening around me, I’ve come to the conclusion that this is, indeed, freedom.

Again, is it always easy?
Nope.

I’m choosing this path as my default…as my new ‘normal.’ Not to deny my feelings. In fact, it’s quite the opposite. I believe it is vital that I acknowledge my emotions and thoughts, feel them fully, and allow them to flow through me.

When I’m deep into worry about cash flow…or wishing that my under-functioning thyroid would resolve itself more quickly (and naturally)…or when I’m disappointed in someone’s response to me and it feels like they just don’t ‘get’ me…or when my love and I get into our ‘dog and fish’ conversations (as our friend Sarah used to call them), those are the times I have to consciously pull myself back to choosing my internal freedom. I bring myself as present as possible, feel my feelings, examine my thoughts, and let them flow. Sometimes I even have to keep repeating, “These feelings are not who I am. These feelings do not define me. I choose to return to presence and peace and love.”

Who Am I? Where Is My Power?

Another important lesson I’m learning in all this is that I also need to remember who I am.

I am the thinker of my thoughts, the feeler of my feelings. I am the observer of all this. Thoughts and feelings are real but transient. They do not need to define me. I do not need to identify with them. Experience them and let the flow, yes. But my thoughts and feelings are not me. Detaching from identifying with whatever is going on in the external world is freedom. Remembering who I truly AM—at my soul level—that’s when I am free.

My true essence is powerful, present, and abundant beyond measure. THAT is what I need to return to…over and over. THAT is freedom.