Freedom is the ability to guide yourself based on your intuition, with respect to the community of which you are obviously a part.

“Thus far, this is what makes the most sense: Freedom is the ability to guide yourself based on your intuition, with respect to the community of which you are obviously a part. I just don’t know how we could improve this ability without prioritizing ‘real’ wellness.”

If you haven’t noticed, I’ve been on a real “freedom” kick recently. Freedom, and Play.

It seems like a lot of people really care about freedom. They sure talk a lot about it, at least.

To paraphrase Inigo Montoya, though, we keep using that word, but I am not sure we know what it means.

Sure, maybe it means something different for you than it does for your neighbor, or even your spouse, but let’s be honest, if we don’t have some consensus on what freedom means, we’re probably going to be spinning our wheels in some respects.

Freedom, as I see it, is essentially a concept, but, depending on HOW you live, it is also an innate aspect of existence. No matter what, though, this concept definitely informs our lives.

As a concept, I’ve been trying to boil it down to 6 seemingly universal principles.

6 may be ambitious, but it’s worth a try…

Here’s where I am at so far:

1. The best measure for the value of any concepts is its effect on our HEALTH.

2. The easiest place to begin in terms of improving one’s health is to recognize that we need pressure on the skeletal system, and that there is an ideal way to organize ourselves with respect to this PRESSURE depending on the context of what we are doing.

3. In other words, in order to evaluate a concept, we need to be honest with ourselves about how effective it is in terms of helping us relate to the NECESSARY PRESSURE of existence.

4. If the concept is LIMITING our capacity to explore and to discover, it is worth questioning.

5. There is a chance, though, that the concept could be limiting because it is rooted in a need to respect diversity. Interconnectivity and diversity are two of the main “limiting factors” of life, aka, RULES.

6. If we choose to respect diversity, we inevitably have to become LIFELONG LEARNERS, because there will always be something new to experience. Diversity begets more diversity, and diversity cannot be fully contained. Newness is unavoidable.

In effect, ultimately, the experience of freedom cannot be static. It HAS TO evolve.

6. Does this all the questions about freedom? No. Not at all. I spend most of my time thinking about this stuff. I’m just trying to simplify as I go.

For example, why become a lifelong learner?

How do I best organize my spine and pelvis and skeletal system?

What the heck does play have to do with any of this?

Mostly, though, is this about freedom FROM or freedom WITHIN?

How about both?

For now, just food for thought…