You shall be free indeed when your days are not without a care nor your nights without a want and a grief, But rather when these things girdle your life and yet you rise above them naked and unbound. Kahil Gibram

To have your days without a care and your nights without a want one requires peace of mind that comes with security.

This means you need somewhere to live and enough money to be able to eat, sleep and work without worrying.

There is a freedom in surviving without undue stress, of knowing you are fed, clothed and have a home. To do this you need enough money, or an income, that makes this possible.

Whether we are working or not working, having this basic right means you have the freedom to live as you please.

There are levels to this basic right. Someone wants to live in a castle with 45 rooms, someone wants a hut by a beach. Most of us aim at a house or apartment somewhere and call it home. If you want more than you already have, then its up to you to work out how to get it, and this is where you need to make sufficient money to cover your desire and wants.

Freedom is accepting what you have and working within that boundary, so you are not bonded to inceasing what you already have because of your desire. As soon as you want more than you already have, you set the motions of new boundaries, and start looking for ways of changing.

However, if you can strive to expand your horizons, and enjoy that striving, then you are truly happy and free.

Freedom is accepting your limitations and rising above them to achieve even greater limitations, for always will we have limits which we have created.

Remember Jonathan Livingstone Seagull. He flew higher each time he reached the height he has set himself. That is true freedom...having and taking the choice to rise beyond a limitation.

Freedom is being free to make choices within a chosen choice, and being contented with the selected choice, and then making a new choice. Staying within the choice is not freedom. It is false security and also static. Many of us stay in the same situation all our lives. If this makes you happy that is fine, but if it doesn't, then you have the power to change. You also have the choice of making choices within your choice. eg You stay in the same house, but you change vacation locations, what you eat, your activities and create an active lifestyle.

No-one says we have to stay where we are. We are free to change if the current situation is not as we wish it to be. If your job is causing pain, change it. Find another job. If you hate where you live, move. Find a better home. If you are unhappy with your marriage or partner, break away. Accepting status quo and complaining is not the right solution.

It takes courage and strength to admit that what you have is not working, and then try again.

Freedom means we have this choice....Only you decide what you now have.

That is true freedom.

Maggi Carstairs 2008 

We hold in our hands, the most precious gift of all: Freedom. The freedom to express our art. Our love. The freedom to be who we want to be. We are not going to give that freedom away and no one shall take it from us! Diane Frolov and Andrew Schneider, Northern Exposure, Cicely, 1992