Freedom what does it really mean?
From a
very young age, I longed for release from pain and war. Born as a
freedom-loving Sagittarius to German Jew Refugees during World War ll, my
desire for freedom guided my life until today.
In my
search for self-liberation, I have gone through different stages of
understanding. I grew up in a warring environment and a home where my parents
fought bitterly, particularly since they too dealt with a heavy cloud caused by
the loss of family in Germany. In addition to the inner turmoil at home,
outside we suffered the fear of physical attack and death in the streets of
Jerusalem, Palestine under the British mandate rule (now Israel.) Influenced by
my parents and the overwhelming atmosphere, I wanted to get away from such
oppression. I longed for the privilege of having food rather than going hungry,
and freedom from the fear of war and guns. The wish to unload the heaviness on
my shoulders from the age of three, guided my urge to escape and find another
way. Later, as an adolescent, I reluctantly succumbed to parental supervision
and the provincial rule-based society I lived in at the time. But I dreamed of
liberation as soon as possible.
Luckily
for me, my father left us and emigrated to the U.S.A. When I reached my late
twenties, he invited me to visit him in New York for the summer. My encounter
with the American culture greatly enlarged and transformed my idea of freedom.
Visiting and then living in a leisure-oriented society void of any inkling of
real war or hunger on the land, I found America to be the pinnacle of abundance
and plenty, so opposite from the culture I came from. I had just arrived at the
end of yet another Israeli war. The American culture focused on undoing
oppression by fighting the established conservative political structure and by
supporting the change in my attitude toward the underdog. Specifically, I saw
the black community fighting for liberation from injustice based on history’s
legacy of slavery. Kris Kristofferson and Joplin’s timely
Bobbie McGee, song -“freedom is just another word for nothing left to lose’
brings in another version of the topic of liberation as surrender for a cause
bigger than life. This invited me to consider surrender as the next exploration
for my evolution.
A bit
later, when I landed in California, freedom looked to me as license to indulge
in hedonism, criticisms of the system and the rest of what the Hippie movement
offered: sex, drugs, and rock-n-roll, as they called it then. Initially I felt
aghast, then joined in and enjoyed the hedonistic experience until I burned out
on it. It didn’t bring me immunity from anxiety, or negative reactions to work,
or relationships.
I
urgently searched for “real” freedom that would allow me a state of
contentment, peace of mind and satisfaction. I realized this was different from
carte blanche behavior.
I wanted
to find inner freedom, a true liberation from suffering. I chose meditation as
my path now. It presented a challenge, but helped me look squarely into my
inner resistance, unhappiness, and arrogant judgements. I knew I had finally
found the true source of freedom. This journey continues to offer opportunities
and an interior wisdom. It also opens my heart with more love, something I
longed for from the beginning of my life. To learn more about the journey I
took to come home, check my memoir: From Mud to Lotus: I meant to behave but
there were too many other options. There you can find more in-depth
explorations of the topic.
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