The hardest thing about keeping a blog is finding the inspiration to write, especially when the subject material is neither defined or planned, when a fling with any nuance is possible. It may seem that it broadens the scope to whatever takes the imaginations fancy but it seemingly narrows the stream of consciousness into a funnel that bottlenecks the vastness. Perhaps I should choose some topic of interest and develop my knowledge by writing and analysing it but I wish to leave the way open so I can feel less constricted. Consequently I’m often left feeling overwhelmed with the open end that choice allows.

A lot of my interests lately have been in the philosophical realm concerning the notion of freedom and if there is any real freedom that is authentic. Sartre was obsessed with freedom and choice and I guess I have been influenced by the ideal that we can be free but I am increasingly being confronted with the thought that freedom is merely a fantasy or illusion. Maybe it’s because we are dependent on so many things just to be able to live. Freedom has been placed topsy turvy and what we mean is a controlled freedom, which in my mind isn’t freedom at all.

I read today on a forum that freedom is something we feel, we are free if we feel free (it’s quite possible that it was provided as a quotation from somebody but I’ve lost track of who may have said it originally). Perhaps there is some merit in this association and it makes sense intuitively but is this really freedom or just giving way to the illusion that one is free? My interest lies with the concept because I have this niggling conflict with the accepted meaning as we commonly ascribe to it and the feeling that I am enslaved by some thing that is beyond reach and that I am not as free as I might like to believe I am.

It’s a paradox and maybe it is this paradox that inhibits freedom. In essence I am free to do whatever I please, whatever  fancy that may possess the imagination I can theoretically indulge within the limits of  my capability and physical laws, however I am also a moral agent and am bound by conscience. These limitations are reasonable so perhaps they can be eliminated from the authenticity of actualised freedom and by not having physical and moral restraints it is conceivable that freedom is a given certainty. However there is still an uneasy feeling that freedom hasn’t been really actualised but rather the creation of boundaries has occurred. I am free within these boundaries but I’m also trapped inside lesser boundaries which can be crossed but still are existent. Maybe the best I can I hope for is a broadening of these other boundaries to  a more spacious surround.