Dave Rogers follows up with, among other words:
Some people spend much of their lives building and moving into bigger and supposedly better boxes. I like being comfortable. Though I must say, I've learned most of the important things in my life by being very uncomfortable.
I think there are two types of comfort that have little to do with each other. Those of us who have the choice of whether or not to be comfortable in our current states tend to think of comfort as a choice people make. In an obese nation, for example, we can talk about whether or not we really need to lose or gain weight, or whether we should just learn to accept whatever weight we currently have.
But I think that’s the exception to common life experience. Most people really don’t have that choice. They really have a "box" constraining them. They either gain weight by finding the "bigger box," or they die. Or maybe the "box" is a lack of health care, or a civil war, or maybe they’re caught up in human trafficking, and it’s literally a box. There’s no shortage of real problems people can’t choose whether or not to face.
In America, and much of the developed world, we have no shortage of imaginary problems we can choose whether or not to face. We can decide when our boat is big enough because we aren’t drowning. But even for many Americans, that’s not the case, and it would be insulting to tell someone drowning that they’re just imagining their problems. I think most constraints on freedom are real and important, and that’s what I mean when I say "seriously, there is a box."
Probably at some point, there’s an inverse connection between the imagined constraints and the real ones, when building a large boat requires taking that last scrap of wood from the drowning victims. But I don’t think this is the norm, and in most cases, the two types of constraints, chosen and forced, have little in common. It seems to me that I’m focusing on the latter and Dave is focusing on the former and we’re not so much disagreeing about this being an elephant as we are focusing on different parts of it.
I think you're talking about things that are real problems, but have little to do with freedom, unless you're channeling Roosevelt and the Four Freedoms. As much as I am sympathetic with the four freedoms, I'm not persuaded they have much to do with freedom either.
Knowledge, information, beliefs, whatever you want to call them, when properly applied to affect human behavior, can solve problems.
Often creating new ones in their wake, but that's another story.
Seriously, there are problems. But being "free" doesn't make anyone immune from problems, or drowning, or suffering, or dying.
Everybody suffers, some more than others and it isn't always obvious who might be suffering more than another. Certainly not by the circumstances of their particular external "box."
Consider a little Kris Krisoferson here, "Freedom's just another word for nothin' left to lose."
Or consider this URL:
http://www.storyarts.org/library/nutshell/stories/strawberry.html
You're free to choose how to perceive your circumstances. Acquiring the knowledge to do so usually involves letting go of a lot of things you already "know."
I'm not sure I "know" how to explain it any better, though I'm happy to go on trying. I do know it really won't matter until it's something you kind of figure out for yourself. I don't mean to sound condescending, and I hope I don't sound that way. But I'm happy to help, and I've had, and continue to enjoy, plenty of help.
So, do you want freedom from problems? Or would you just prefer to see some problems solved? One you can have, the other, I'm afraid not.
And while you're at it, solve the problem of this TINY TEXT BOX!
"Anybody got a crowbar?"
I always thought Janis Joplin wrote that about nothing left to lose. And I also thought she never would have written that if she really had nothing left to lose. Buddha tried asceticism, found it wasn't all that great, and moved on to something more moderate.
I want freedom from some problems. Other problems, I want solved. I don't really see what the big deal is, for example, with snakes on a plane. I think I can learn to be content on a plane with snakes. I haven't seen the movie, so perhaps I'm not understanding his context, but it seems to me Samuel L Jackson's character just needs to calm down a bit.
But if I'm about to die, I don't want a strawberry; I want to not die. And if I'm ill, I don't want a strawberry; I want to not be ill. And if I'm poor, I don't want a strawberry; I want to not be poor. The strawberry of living in the moment might taste great, but that's not a high priority for me when the rest of the moment is awful. I might eat it anyway, but I won't expect it to make my impending death any less disappointing.
But Scott, what you're asking for is freedom from problems, freedom from suffering. Now it's true Janis Joplin sang Me and Bobby McGee, but I'm pretty sure Kris Kristoferson wrote it. Anyway, ascetism isn't the point of "nothing left to lose." It's not being attached.
We lose everything in life, to include life. Sometimes we can hang onto something, but that often creates problems of its own (leaping onto the vine over the cliff). So to be free from suffering, you must be non-attached to your desire of what you want the world to be. Suffering being the difference between the way things are and the way we want them to be.
I told this story once on my old editthispage.com site, but I'll mention it here. It's not a great story, but it was something of a realization for me.
I went to the movies one night and there was a family there at the concession stand, parents and two kids. One young daughter appeared to be a normal little girl, the other was severely physically deformed. She wasn't an amputee, but her arms and legs were little more than stumps or flippers.
At first I was overwhelmed with this feeling of, I don't know, sadness?, compassion?, it was not a good feeling, for this young lady and her parents. But then as I watched them, I saw nothing out of the ordinary apart from this little girl's appearance. Her condition didn't seem to be a source of suffering for her at that moment. As I recall, she was getting about okay and telling her parents what she wanted from the concession stand, seeming as happy to be going to the movies as her sister.
Now, to be sure, that young lady will face different challenges, almost certainly more difficult ones, than I have in my life. But should I feel sorry for her? Or should I celebrate her life?
And I began to believe that my pity for her was probably misplaced.
We all have challenges or problems, boxes that limit us in ways that perhaps we might wish they did not. But there is no end to that, no matter what crowbars we find, or how much we know about boxes. Now, if we happen to find ourselves in a box, and have a crowbar, then by all means, if getting out is something we wish to do, we should get out. I'm not saying do nothing about something you can do something about.
But if you're hanging on a vine about to be eaten by tigers, you can spend your final moments cursing your bad luck, being angry or frightened, or you can enjoy a strawberry.
I'm not saying I'm the guy who would enjoy the strawberry, but I recognize that as the only freedom that really has any meaning to me. And I don't happen to think that more external knowledge helps me to achieve that level of non-attachment. The freedom to live in each moment as it unfolds in my life, perhaps only finding reason to be grateful in the ability to draw another breath, and not in bitter denial of the present, or in fear or dread of an uncertain future, or longing for or resenting a past that is forever gone.
It is perhaps, one moment at a time, enough simply to just be.
But thanks for the bigger box!
(Now how about preview and spell-check?) ;^)
And again, I don't think we've really disagreed about much of anything. Knowledge is a crowbar. When it's helpful, it's helpful, and when it's not, it's not. It may not be particularly helpful for either of us, but still important for other people.
I doubt I would eat a strawberry, nor would I curse my bad luck. I'd probably look around for a way to get off the vine, and I'd probably keep looking until I fell to my death. Or maybe I'd just watch as I fell. In my previous car wreck experiences, I've just watched the oncoming collision and thought "well, here comes death."
I'm not looking for non-attachment in general. I've found it helpful in specific instances (e.g. I'm definitely too attached to my computer), but not at all helpful in others (e.g. I'm attached to water or oxygen or insulin just enough to make me happy), so I don't find it works as general goal in life, though it does in specific contexts.
You should have spell check on your computer (apple-semicolon), but I'll look into adding preview as I move this all to typewriting.org, should I ever get around to doing that.