Freedom- A Trichotomy
-----I am not free. For the past several years, I have watched as my mother, her hands blistered and chafed, walked out the front door at 5:30 am in the early morning, running for the bus to take her to work. The sacrifices she made for me, both financially and emotionally, were priceless. In that sense, I am certainly not free. In sociology class, my professor told us rather matter-of-factly that large jumps in social status are rarely possible, that the rag to riches story of Horatio Alger is a mere fantasy of the poor. However, I was raised by a man and a woman who taught me to dream without boundaries. They gave me all that they ever owned, and in giving, we are rich. Because of their giving, I am free.
-----However, I have been confronted with several other dilemmas regarding freedom in the past few years. Strangely, the question of freedom gnaws at me, myself only one victim of its enigma in a sea of billions. Growing up, I have always felt destined for the stars; my name, which means "the son who soars" in Chinese, might also be a part of the reason why. As a kid, I would stare at the sky and imagine green aliens out there, waiting to meet me someday. However, as I grew up, I have come to realize that space, the vast blackness that surrounds and sometimes scares us, symbolizes the ultimate freedom. However, I frequent ask myself, will I ever attain that ultimate freedom? Am I truly free?
-----Philosopher John Locke once proposed a problem regarding free will. In this problem, Locke asked whether a willing prisoner, locked inside a jailed room, is free. The man wants to stay within that jail cell, in fact, he would be unhappy being anywhere else. However, the moment he tries looking for the nonexistent exit, he will realize that he is not free. Like the jailed prisoner, I too have come to belief that I am not free. The Earth is my jailed room, and I am the prisoner who is no longer willing to stay put. The more I yearn for alien worlds and the more vivid my dream of someday being able to explore the contents of the universe becomes, the stronger I feel the tightening grasp of my humanity, imposing a limit on my freedom.
-----For several months after I first found my answer to the question "Are you free?" the world seems to fall into a rather colorless jumble. I know that the pessimistic lenses can only see the colder lifeless colors of winter months, and yet I have chosen to wear them in this period of anxiety. However, after having lived with a roommate this past summer at the Harvard Summer School program, the question "Are you free?" took on a new meaning.
-----I remember the phone call near midnight on a rainy Friday. The roads on campus were muddied and vacant of students. Yet, on that evening, my roommate was nowhere to be found. I remember reading about the Snowball Earth hypothesis in my astrobiology textbook when my phone rang in the silence. I picked up the phone, and heard on the other end, a rather hesitant question, "Are you free?" my roommate asked me. He became silent after asking, and I heard the sound of rain splattering on the ground beneath him, likely drenching him. I knew then that something was wrong. I closed my astrobiology textbook, and answered "Yea, I am. Where are you right now?" In that moment, I knew that I was free, that I will always be free for him. All the other freedom that I have ever sought became insignificant at that moment, when I heard his voice, calling out to me. I am a friend and, I would like to think, a healer and an up-lifter of the human spirit; thus, I am free, I will always be free.
...
I used ----- because I couldn't indent my paragraphs for some reason.
I just wrote this. What do you guys thinks?
-----I am not free. For the past several years, I have watched as my mother, her hands blistered and chafed, walked out the front door at 5:30 am in the early morning, running for the bus to take her to work. The sacrifices she made for me, both financially and emotionally, were priceless. In that sense, I am certainly not free. In sociology class, my professor told us rather matter-of-factly that large jumps in social status are rarely possible, that the rag to riches story of Horatio Alger is a mere fantasy of the poor. However, I was raised by a man and a woman who taught me to dream without boundaries. They gave me all that they ever owned, and in giving, we are rich. Because of their giving, I am free.
-----However, I have been confronted with several other dilemmas regarding freedom in the past few years. Strangely, the question of freedom gnaws at me, myself only one victim of its enigma in a sea of billions. Growing up, I have always felt destined for the stars; my name, which means "the son who soars" in Chinese, might also be a part of the reason why. As a kid, I would stare at the sky and imagine green aliens out there, waiting to meet me someday. However, as I grew up, I have come to realize that space, the vast blackness that surrounds and sometimes scares us, symbolizes the ultimate freedom. However, I frequent ask myself, will I ever attain that ultimate freedom? Am I truly free?
-----Philosopher John Locke once proposed a problem regarding free will. In this problem, Locke asked whether a willing prisoner, locked inside a jailed room, is free. The man wants to stay within that jail cell, in fact, he would be unhappy being anywhere else. However, the moment he tries looking for the nonexistent exit, he will realize that he is not free. Like the jailed prisoner, I too have come to belief that I am not free. The Earth is my jailed room, and I am the prisoner who is no longer willing to stay put. The more I yearn for alien worlds and the more vivid my dream of someday being able to explore the contents of the universe becomes, the stronger I feel the tightening grasp of my humanity, imposing a limit on my freedom.
-----For several months after I first found my answer to the question "Are you free?" the world seems to fall into a rather colorless jumble. I know that the pessimistic lenses can only see the colder lifeless colors of winter months, and yet I have chosen to wear them in this period of anxiety. However, after having lived with a roommate this past summer at the Harvard Summer School program, the question "Are you free?" took on a new meaning.
-----I remember the phone call near midnight on a rainy Friday. The roads on campus were muddied and vacant of students. Yet, on that evening, my roommate was nowhere to be found. I remember reading about the Snowball Earth hypothesis in my astrobiology textbook when my phone rang in the silence. I picked up the phone, and heard on the other end, a rather hesitant question, "Are you free?" my roommate asked me. He became silent after asking, and I heard the sound of rain splattering on the ground beneath him, likely drenching him. I knew then that something was wrong. I closed my astrobiology textbook, and answered "Yea, I am. Where are you right now?" In that moment, I knew that I was free, that I will always be free for him. All the other freedom that I have ever sought became insignificant at that moment, when I heard his voice, calling out to me. I am a friend and, I would like to think, a healer and an up-lifter of the human spirit; thus, I am free, I will always be free.
...
I used ----- because I couldn't indent my paragraphs for some reason.
I just wrote this. What do you guys thinks?
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