The State of Freedom
A journey of Truth into the mind’s sanctuary
with the destination of inner Freedom.
It is difficult for me to have both ownership and freedom.
I have found that, whenever I acquire something and start considering it as mine, automatically various anxious thoughts are born in my mind, such as how to guard it well in order to keep it in my possession, not to lose it due to negligence, to hide it so as to prevent theft, not to talk to much about it and attract the envy and the evil eye of others, to insure it, to make sure that it will not be worn out or destroyed or claimed by anybody and taken away from me unfairly, as well as many other thoughts which submerge my mind and deprive from me the chance to live my hours and days consciously, with joy and tranquility. I then lose to a great degree my contact with the environment, all around me seem to be insignificant in comparison to my troubles, I take distance from my brothers, the human beings; briefly, I build my own upsetting world and live isolated in it.
Additionally, I have realized that whatever I have lost until now to date has proven not to be irreplaceable. I have often recalled an anxiety episode in the past where I worried about the eventual loss of a material object, or the despair which dominated my mind whenever I really did lose something, and every time I did so I had an afterthought wondering why so much pain for something which I now know that it was not so important.
After all, I think, I am going to lose everything one day, when I die; why should I worry if I lose it a few days or a few thousand days earlier, since nothing will be mine forever? Consequently, the notion “mine” is but a creation of my mind; the truth is that it is a non-existent notion.
I wish I had the courage to renounce all my wealth, from my house to the tiniest material object, because then I would truly be free. If I count how many times per day I unwittingly sink down into upsetting thoughts related to the conservation or the increase of my wealth, I shall easily come to the conclusion that it is actually not I who has the material goods in his possession; but rather they have me in their possession imprisoning me with preoccupations caused by the misled idea that they are mine.
Of course, an even higher level of freedom would be for me to stay free, even while I have ownership. This would be equal to not worry about it and see with similar apathy and placidity the possibility of its absolute loss and the possibility of its proliferation.