{"id":6507,"date":"2022-01-21T13:18:27","date_gmt":"2022-01-21T13:18:27","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.wendyzhou.se\/blog\/?p=6507"},"modified":"2022-01-26T14:30:34","modified_gmt":"2022-01-26T14:30:34","slug":"what-is-freedom-and-why-is-it-that-important","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.wendyzhou.se\/blog\/what-is-freedom-and-why-is-it-that-important\/","title":{"rendered":"What is freedom? And why is it that important?"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

I\u2019ve always been extremely<\/em> passionate about having as much personal freedom as possible. And not only in terms of the contents of my mind, but also in regards to where I am located physically, how I am able to move around in the world, financially, socially, and culturally.<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Related: <\/strong>I can\u2019t stop thinking about the fact that my life is meaningless<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Sidenote<\/strong>: While writing this, I realized that I went way<\/em> over my head diving into this topic. This is something to be written about in a 500+ page book by a professor in philosophy or to be discussed by the UN. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

My personal freedom background<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019ve wanted to not be financially dependent on someone else (whether that be parents, a partner, friends, or even the state).\u00a0I think it stems from the fact that I feel like those who hold the money, they hold the reins. And I want to hold my own reins. And I don\u2019t want anyone to dictate my life any more than absolutely necessary.\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This is not to say that of course, I need other people in my life, emotionally<\/em> and of course, I do depend on others for all the things I get to enjoy from living in a society. Food, clothing, infrastructure, housing, medicine, and other systems.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But I have also always dreamt about being free to move around wherever I want to. Between borders, states, and groups of people. I remember when I was younger and questioning how weird it is that just because you were accidentally born in a specific geographic location on earth, you suddenly had the \u201cright\u201d to be in that part of the planet. While another baby, who was born perhaps just across the border from you, does not have the same right. Like? How can someone or a group of people even ever <\/em>own<\/em><\/strong> <\/strong>a part of a random planetary body? You can\u2019t! It\u2019s just social constructions<\/em>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

And it all boils down to personal freedom. But now I guess I\u2019m writing this in order to understand myself more. What really counts as freedom to me? Should I start growing my own food as well and become an anarchist? Or should I draw some type of invisible line between what types of freedom I demand, and in what areas I choose to give up control?<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Okay now when I\u2019ve come this far in my reasoning, I don\u2019t think I\u2019ll ever know the answer to this question because I\u2019m getting mind boggled by all the layers upon layers of social constructs that\u2019s going through my head. I also get reminded by a famous quote by some philosopher that said \u201cFreedom is an illusion\u201d. I\u2019m not sure if I even really want to get into that one. Is it mental suicide? Do I want to mentally suicide myself? Perhaps a little. Let\u2019s move on and see what happens to my brain.<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Requisites for personal freedom (A list)<\/h2>\n\n\n\n

I love lists because they make a messy world and a messy mind seem more structured. So to even begin tackling this question of \u201cWhat is freedom\u201d, I need to make a list of the things that I require in order to feel satisfied in my degree of freedom. (Oh! And there we may also have something else. \u201cDegree of freedom\u201d, is that a thing?)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What is needed for freedom<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n