What We Can Learn About Liberation From Osama Bin Laden
Photo by Josh Pesavento/Flickr Creative Commons
This feels like a risky post to publish. I’m aware that the recent news about Osama bin Laden’s death has triggered intense emotions for many people. This post might push your political buttons, but that’s not my intention.
What I want to look at here is freedom from in contrast to freedom to.
And the events of this past week strike me as a potent teaching moment for that.
Freedom from is an aversive reaction. We think we need to be free from something, like debt, or our job, or another person, in order to be happy. Our thinking goes like this: If I could just get rid of ___________, my life would be so much better. I would be happier.
In Osama bin Laden’s case, the freedom from dynamic seems to crop up on all sides. Bin Laden’s deadly plans were motivated, at least in part, by the desire to liberate Muslims from the presence of the U.S. military throughout the Middle East. (Please know that nothing I write here is intended to justify the horrible tragedy of September 11, 2001.)
On the other side of the coin, many Americans felt they needed to be assured of bin Laden’s death in order to feel safe again. We wanted to get rid of him. It’s the same dynamic that’s in play when people say they are in favor of the death penalty because it brings closure to the families of the victims. We Americans are actually pretty adept at freedom from. It was even one of the seeds of the birth of our country—we liberated ourselves from the British Empire.
Now please remember what I said before… my interest is not in debating politics here. Instead, I want to look at what it is that happens when we operate in the freedom from dynamic.
Freedom from is based on fear and unprocessed anger.
When we act from that space, we will create more of the same. This is the meaning of karma in its most basic sense. And we can clearly see how this manifested in the story of Osama bin Laden. While both sides were hoping for a positive outcome from their actions, in reality even more suffering was the result.
When our actions originate in a freedom from mindset, we tend to not look at the root causes of suffering in our life. We are satisfied with a band-aid approach—but it almost always backfires on us later on. We leave the job we hated and get a new one, only to find out after a few months that similar issues are arising. We leave the relationship that was causing us aggravation, and then discover that our next relationship hits the same rocky shoals.
Freedom from also often implies running away from responsibility. We hold some fantasy about not having to be accountable for our actions, thinking that we exist in a vacuum where our choices don’t affect anyone.
Freedom to is about opening up possibilities. Freedom to finds its motivation in love.
You can take the same situation in your life and look at it through the lens of freedom from, and then through the lens of freedom to. For example – let’s say you’re struggling to pay off a lot of credit card debt. (I know this one well; I was in the same situation once). One approach is to hate that experience so much that you look around for a quick fix. (Hint: there isn’t one.)
Or you may promise yourself that you’re going to start saving more money to pay it off, but then you get frustrated and give up, and get yourself in even more debt. All this is happening because you’re not tapped into the freedom to mode. You are operating more from aversion than from a source of positive motivation.
These principles hold on a bigger stage as well. The power and effectiveness behind Martin Luther King Jr.’s words and actions came from the fact that they were based on love for his fellow human beings, not on fear or anger.
There are, of course, times when “freedom from” is absolutely necessary. Don’t stay in a harmful, abusive situation longer than necessary. If your house is burning down, you need to get out.
I would propose that 99% of the time, given that the situation isn’t one where your physical wellbeing is threatened, you will end up having much better results if you’ve made decisions based on freedom to rather than freedom from.
Freedom from something may seem liberating. Be careful.
Everything you try to run away from owns you in some way.
The kind of freedom that moves toward something requires deep commitment and discipline. But it’s also the most genuine and most lasting.
Find ways to move toward what you love, rather than away from what you fear.
Think about this in your own life: What are you moving toward right now? What are you running away from? How can you shift freedom from into freedom to?
_________________
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13 Comments
What an insightful piece! Thanks Maia, for your inspired reflections. I’m somewhat embarrassed that this is the first Liberated Life Project post I’ve read. I look forward to others.
Yes, so many of us like “freedom” yet fail to distinguish differences in purpose. In the Biblical context, freedom always led from something old and repressive toward something new and liberating. From slavery in Egypt to a new life in Canaan. From self-centeredness to serving humanity. Many of us know in FD Roosevelt’s “Four Freedoms” he mentions two “of”s (speech and religion) and two “from”s (fear and want). No “to” or “toward”. Your post reminds us and helps clarify a necessary movement.
Here’s a section of an article written last year by Jim Wallis and widely circulated:
“The second question asks: Do we believe in freedom for my religion or freedom of religion? The “Establishment” and “Free Exercise” clauses of the First Amendment were nothing less than revolutionary statements. They ignited across the globe a new level of religious freedom and protection. As with many parts of our Constitution, they represent ideals to which we aspire but have not always lived up to. Anti-Catholic sentiment barred Catholics from holding many public offices for years. Anti-Semitism and other forms of religious bigotry have reared their ugly head over and over in our history. But ultimately, many minority groups have flourished in this country, and those who are persecuted in other areas of the world seek asylum here because of our strong history of religious liberty, protection, and freedom. In 2008, our country distinguished itself globally by electing someone of a racial minority as president. We have resisted restrictions on religious expressions targeted at Islam that are appearing in other countries across the world. This speaks greatly to our ability to live up to the ideals in our founding documents.”
May 12, 2011
Great to have you here, Alan… and thanks for what you wrote here.
May 13, 2011
Brilliant-just brilliant. I’ve often spoken of the difference between doing from a place of fear vs. doing from a place of love, but the “freedom from” thinking is new to me-and so powerful. I expect it will impact my life and the lives of my clients in significant ways. Sometimes wording a concept in a new way just gives it so much more authority. Thank you!
May 11, 2011
Sue,
Thank you so much for taking time to read this post, and glad it spoke to you. And thanks also for being a new member of Team Liberation!
in kindness,
Maia
May 12, 2011
Maia, thank you for having the guts to publish what had to be scary. It’s a wonderful perspective and something I need to be reminded of regularly.
Focus on what you want to create in life, not what you don’t want to do/be/have.
May 10, 2011
Good perspective on this event.
May 10, 2011
Maia,
We want the people we care for to be free from suffering, but often the most obvious solution is exactly what inflames the original problem. That’s because the initial response is to approach it emotionally – to make ourselves ‘feel better’.
I’ve just come out of a sticky situation with a member of my extended family. Being able to say, “No, I won’t enable you,” was difficult. But being aware of the situation through the veil of my feelings about it gave me the ability to do the right thing. I know he’ll be hurting more for a while, but I won’t be fanning the flames of his suffering.
Feeling anger and betrayal with his actions, I don’t have to retaliate and make the problem worse. Trying to “scratch the itch” of anger with violence almost always makes the itch worse – and at best, does nothing. That’s not a good track record. As we will see demonstrated, unfolding from the events last week with Bin Laden’s death.
Thank you for being brave and posting this. I respect you all the more for it.
Gassho,
Emily
May 10, 2011
It is by your courage to write about the elephant in the room that others find their courage too, and we are all propelled to move forward. Thank you. With Joy and Blessings.
May 10, 2011
Thank you, Jacq.
May 10, 2011
Maia, I really like this post – thank you. And risky though it may be, given the volatile political mood of the past week, I think it’s really important that people are having these kinds of conversations. The way I see it, there’s far too much at stake to *not* be sharing ideas like this and finding something to learn from the situation. Although to me it’s not so much about what we can learn from Osama bin Laden (I suspect there is nothing I would want to learn), but I think we can learn much from the world’s response to his death. I don’t want to get political here either and so won’t start a debate about the rightness or wrongness of people’s emotional reactions. But I agree with your distinctions between ‘freedom from’ and ‘freedom to’, and that seeking freedom from something often stems from fear – maybe it’s the easier, more instinctive human reaction? Whereas pursuing the other kind of freedom will deepen our humanity in a way that acting out of fear never will. Maybe what we need to recognise is that we still have the freedom to choose love despite all the things we have to be fearful of. (And I also say this with the added disclaimer that of course nothing justifies the terrible events of 9/11, or the thousands of innocent lives lost then and since.)
By the way, your last line reminds me of a poem by Michael Leunig (Australian poet/cartoonist/social commentator). Do you know of him? I suspect you might like much of his work, especially the two collections of non-faith-specific prayers (which are really more like poems). Here’s the one your post reminded me of:
“There are only two feelings. Love and fear. There are only two languages. Love and fear. There are only two activities. Love and fear. There are only two motives, two procedures, two frameworks, two results. Love and fear. Love and fear.”
Blessings,
Bronwyn
May 10, 2011
Thank you, Bronwyn. I appreciate the care you took in reading through the post, and your comments add a lot to it. I wonder if “freedom from” is rooted in our more primal nature, as you note… and as we evolve more as human beings, we get to practice more with an alternative approach to life, one less fear-driven.
I have not heard of Michael Leunig, but I love what you shared here from him. I’ll look him up!
blessings,
Maia
May 10, 2011
Thanks for your courage in writing this, Maia. Well done!
May 10, 2011
Thanks, Kate… I deeply appreciate your presence here!
May 10, 2011