Talking About Freedom

Ana Garcia

Sometimes we wonder how we can achieve Freedom. We have everything we want and need, but still we seem to have less freedom than those who do not have all the material things. So, what is the secret?
Sometime ago I read somewhere that even in the most severe cases of freedom deprivation, e.g. being in prison, a prisoner has the capability to feel free.

How can this be? I wondered…

As I was thinking about it the first thing that came to my mind was that you don’t have to be in prison to feel like a prisoner, the same as you don’t have to feel as a prisoner just because you are in prison. We can be in the outside world and still feel oppressed by all the demands and stresses of the world around us.

The next thing that came to me was the idea that “you must make space for everything you want to experience in your life”. If you want more time, you have to make time; if you want more love, you have to give love first; if you want more money, you have to let go of the control of your own money, share it, create a flow of give and take, and have faith in the Universal Law of Abundance, which tells us that everything we give to others we give to ourselves, so whatever we give will come back to us tenfold.

So I thought: I need to make space so that I can expand my soul. This will create more choice in my life because I will have more room to manoeuvre, and this in turn will create the illusion of freedom. Because freedom is choice and choice is freedom.

So I did this: I visualised my personal space getting bigger. I had to say “no” a few times. I had to keep my integrity by making certain choices that were unpopular but that I felt was the right path for me. I had to have the strength to be true to myself first and show my true colours to those who wanted from me more than I could or wanted to give. I had to be selfish in a self-nurturing way. I had to decide how much I had for giving, to whom, when … I had to set up my own terms and stick to them as long as it felt fair and right; or I had to compromise to a certain point that didn’t feel like “selling my soul” in exchange of acceptance, material gain, bending to emotional blackmail, etc.

As I did this, in many an occasion I was going back to my old thought pattern of “feeling guilty” since I was not being reasonable with others, because I wasn’t the old “doormat” for others any more. In other occasions I was going back to the old thought pattern of “feeling responsible” for other people’s feelings and reactions, for not giving them what they were asking (whatever this was at the time).

Miraculously, after a while, I was astonished to see that people STOPPED pushing my buttons; they QUIT trying to play emotional games with me; they DIDN’T EVEN TRY to manipulate me any more and not only they didn’t resent my new found strength, but they started to RESPECT ME and even LIKE ME!

I thought: this is curious. Just when you think you are doing everything right to please others, you get all the wrong results. And just when you have to cringe your teeth together because you think everyone will judge you and dislike you for being so “nasty” (meaning not accommodating their demands on you) things turn round and you just get what you originally wanted!

Well, if anyone understands how it works …

About the Author

Ana is a Reiki Master, Spiritual Coach and works with Native American spiritually based Animal Strategy. As a result, Ana helps people untangle themselves from painful emotional turmoil and struggle by attaining inner harmony, detachment and self-reliance. Ana will help you draw out your inner wisdom so that you can tackle life challenges in practical and inspiring ways.