P.A.S.S.I.O.N.

(Photo taken by me, April 2011)

Positive
Absorbing
Satisfying
Surrendering
Ideal
Open
Nowness

I find when I'm having those moments (or days, weeks, even months) where I'm feeling particular things in life seem insurmountable or difficult to change, it's helpful to bring my focus back to something that can balance out my mood, even if just for a little while.

There are some things within our control and some things that are obviously not within our control. We don't know what will come of our jobs, our health, our relationships, or even the physical environment around us. What we can become aware of, cultivate, and pursue with pleasantly reckless abandon? P.A.S.S.I.O.N.

Passion was instilled within me from a very early age, without me even realizing it until my adulthood (upon reflection). My first passion? Reading and books. Pretty sure I was reading by osmosis in utero via any and all books resting on my mom's pregnant belly during those nine months. Reading is a comforting and sometimes inspiring constant, the one activity that always improves my mood even when the stuff I can't control (ie, aforementioned jobs, relationships, health, what's going on around me) gets to me. Buying books, smelling the pages of new or old books, reading and talking about books with like-minded people, holding books, reading books, giving books to friends, giving book recommendations to anyone and everyone, and holding on to my favorite books on bookshelves. This is what I do as often as possible.

My other passions? Writing (obviously), photography, traveling, learning and challenging myself in new ways (personally and professionally), and most recently the beautiful and intoxicating art of dance.

What fascinates me most about passion is that it offers the opportunity for short-term and long-term satisfaction. A passion can last a lifetime or it can appear spontaneously for just a season. A passion can resonate with you at a young age or show up in older age. A passion may strongly reflect who you are at the core or merely serve as a snapshot of a side of yourself you didn't even know existed. In essence, passion is positive, absorbing, satisfying, surrendering, ideal, being open and in the now.

What are your passions? Are you pursuing them?

Paradox of personal freedoms

When I Google the word "freedom," this is what I come across:

1. personal liberty, as from slavery, bondage, serfdom, etc.

2. liberation or deliverance, as from confinement or bondage

3. (Government, Politics & Diplomacy) the quality or state of being free, esp to enjoy political and civil liberties

4. the state of being without something unpleasant or bad; exemption or immunity freedom from taxation

5. the right or privilege of unrestricted use or access the freedom of a city

6. autonomy, self-government, or independence

7. the power or liberty to order one's own actions

8. the quality, esp of the will or the individual, of not being totally constrained; able to choose between alternative actions in identical circumstances

9. ease or frankness of manner

10. excessive familiarity of manner; boldness

11. ease and grace, as of movement; lack of effort

Too bad applying one of these straightforward definitions to an individual's life and what it means to have 'freedom' isn't quite so simplistic. Especially when one freedom chosen is at the expense of another freedom that must be sacrificed or given up.

When juxtaposed one against the other, when it's impossible to have both at the same time....how does one choose which kind of freedom is the most meaningful, the one that will reap the most happiness and reward? Would you rather give up your personal independence (#6 and #7 above) so that you have liberation from an extremist oppressive culture? (#2-5)? Or would you rather be completely honest, yet confined to a place where you likely will not grow to your full potential? Would you rather follow your instincts or would you rather be obedient?

What if you had to lie to the government for the cost of your freedom? Would it matter if it was a decision that would only affect your life for a few years versus the rest of your life? Imagine that your quality of life in most aspects would be better in country A than country B.

If absolute freedom doesn't exist, what kind of freedom would you ultimately choose and why? Have you ever had to make such a choice? And furthermore, is lying sometimes necessary and justified in order to fight for one of these freedoms?