33. Freedom

The wonderful thing about residing in the USA is that we enjoy (for the most part) personal freedom. We can choose where to work, whether to go to college, to enter into relationships and so on. These are not guaranteed rights. You have to compete to get the best jobs, be accepted to high-ranked colleges and win desirable mates. You can decide to lay in bed all day playing video games or be outside facing the challenges of the real world.

Why is this important? If you feel trapped in a dead-end, meager salary wage-slave job, know this. It’s all your fault. You were not shanghaied like drunk sailors on shore leave in the 1800’s and pressed into service in Her Majesty’s Royal Navy. No. You chose or more likely ended up exactly where and what you are. You can get up right now, walk out the door and leave that life behind. Divorce is a phone call to a lawyer away. You can move unfettered to any state in the Union at anytime. You can travel or live most anywhere on the planet if you have the resources.

Most people are anchors. They won’t accept life on its own terms and take risks to be happy. They want to hold you back because the contrast of their life with a truly free person is blindingly painful. Share your plans and dreams and they react viciously (passive aggressively) to point out the impossibility and perceived risks. You are expected to stay in the mud with them. Your greatest challenge is to stand up and act without seeking acceptance or approvals. Just act. Leave.

Maybe the Wheels of Confusion are turning fast in your head. Your life was granted to you by (God or whatever you believe in). Objectives and expectations were set. If you feel anxious, ill-at-ease, despondent or depressed the primary fundamental cause is a subconscious awareness that you are failing your mission. Not in material possessions, status or power. But more importantly, the life you planned. These uncomfortable feelings are there to guide you in the right directions as sure as pain tells you to drop the hot pan you inadvertently picked up.

For this reason you must act. Not for any particular gains but because it’s who you are and destined to be. Get up. Move. Don’t look back. The sun is rising in the East and setting in the West. Pick a direction. One foot follows the other. The unknown is your friend. Embrace the risk and savor it for it leads to a better life.