Is freedom doing what you want?

Before diving into the debate, it is necessary to note two ideas. The first would be that No one enjoys absolute freedom in the sense of being able to completely abstract from norms and values ​​to act.. The second idea has to do with the fact that freedom not only includes the choice of one action or another, but also extends to thoughts and emotions: we enjoy a certain margin to choose what to think or what to feel.

If we look at our society, we will realize that we consider most people free to choose. Otherwise, what sense would there be in democracy or in the very norms and laws that punish precisely the lack of responsibility that is associated with freedom?

Declaring yourself free is declaring yourself autonomous.

When we are free we are responsible for our decisions, since we are the ones who make them and therefore we assume autonomy, with all the good and bad that this entails. Assuming the cost of what we decide implies the courage to be free to take a path.

A cost that we will try to anticipate, reduce and, ultimately, assume, knowing that we will have to pay it later. We assume that our decision is associated with a risk that can shift the consequences to one side or the other. This risk exists because most of the time we are not the only sculptors of reality, but there are other influencing factors that come into play. Other people, for example.

Being free and thinking for yourself also requires a concession: the permission to make mistakes. Beyond: to fail and try again. Here the concepts of responsibility and cost appear again. For example, many fathers and mothers do not make many of the plans they would like at the time they would like because they know that they have a responsibility for their children and that following their wishes would have a cost for the family.

Being free means taking risks, freedom requires carrying the weight of our decisions. Freedom is not just doing what we want at this moment, it is drawing and building our path by deciding how, where and with whom we travel it.. To be free is to be autonomous to decide for ourselves.

My freedom ends when yours begins

Here is the most important limit of freedom: coexistence with other freedoms, morals and ethics. I am free within a limited space, the one set by my own values, the one the laws leave me. In some areas these laws will be more restrictive than my personal values, in others they will not and conflict will arise. Freedom and autonomy give us a smaller margin of movement than our imagination allows us.

One of the values ​​shared by most people is to do no harm.. Hence, that famous phrase that My freedom begins where the other’s ends. Following this rule is a lesson in itself, since if the laws are violated, there is a punishment for whoever commits it. A restoration that will try to go precisely to restore that damage caused.

Finally, we want to review a curious phenomenon. There are a number of options from which human beings can feel overwhelmed. We have all experienced it. For example, we are going to buy a pen and there are a lot of different types. In principle, it is a lesson that we would not consciously dedicate time to, but it is not unusual to see that we spend 10 minutes choosing, when in reality we would prefer to dedicate that time to other tasks.

This is how that freedom somehow hijacks our will, as if such a large number of options actually bothers us.

With its paradoxes and its benefits, freedom is one of our great privileges. Without a doubt, most of us have a good margin to do and undo as we please, to decide and grow in a way that is ultimately as dependent (due to our social nature) as it is autonomous.

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