Freedom means different things to different people, depending on the context of their lives. In India, before 1947, “azadi” meant freedom from British rule. We believed we would be free if the British went away. They did go away and politically, we are free. But as long as an individual experiences himself as a limited piece of existence, freedom will remain an issue because there is something within a human being that dislikes boundaries.
If you had spent many years in a five-by-five foot cubicle, and I were to unlock you and put you in a 10-by-10 foot cubicle, it would feel like total liberation. But after three days, again you would feel stuck. After 10 years, if I declared you free and put you in a 100-by-100 foot cubicle, again it would seem like a blissful release. But a little later, the same longing would return. However big the boundary, the moment you touch it, you want to break it. Or in other words, there is something within a human being that longs to become boundless.
What is it that can be boundless? All physical forms must have a boundary. A physical form may be small or big, but it must have a defined boundary. The longing to become boundless means there is a longing within you to touch a dimension beyond the physical. This means something within you is longing to be spiritual. Being spiritual does not mean praying or going to a temple. It means you are seeking to experience that which is beyond the limitations of the physical. This longing to be free is within every human being.
How do you become boundless? Right now, boundlessness, freedom or liberation is something that you do not know. Never think of anything which is not a living experience for you because you will start imagining things. Your imagination is always fueled by your experience of life. You can take something that you already know and exaggerate it in so many ways but you cannot imagine something that you do not know.
Never think of anything which is not in your experience. If you want to fly, you do not think about the sky. Your business is how to cut the ropes which are binding you down. So, do not think about freedom, look at your limitations and how to go beyond them – that is a way to progress. Identify at the simplest level, what are the things that bind you? What does not allow you to be joyful? What does not allow you to be a wonderful, full-fledged human being? What causes fear, anxiety, and anger? Start removing them one by one.
If you cut one set of ropes which bind you, there is some sense of freedom. Then you realise, there is another set of ropes that bind you. If you cut that, there is freedom. But then you notice there is another set. There will come a point where if you cut enough of them, nothing binds you anymore. The number of ropes binding you may be big, but still, it cannot be infinite.
Only freedom can be infinite. Bondage cannot be limitless. Only freedom can be limitless. This is not just semantics and ideas. In terms of life’s experience, don’t waste your time talking about or thinking about freedom or the Ultimate. The body is a limitation, the mind is a limitation, and emotions are limitations – but they are also possibilities. Look at what binds you now, and see how to transcend this. This is growth.
In this land, the highest longing in a human being has always been a liberation. The last one or two generations have forgotten that, but otherwise in this country, people lived only for mukti. Mukti is our goal because if you search deep within the very core of who you are, you will understand that it does not matter whether it is pleasures, knowledge, love, relationships, wealth, power or fame, you will get bored of all these things at some point. The only thing that truly matters is freedom, and that is why this culture is important - not just for today but for future generations.
No other culture has looked at a human being with so much depth and understanding and created methods to evolve a person into his ultimate nature. To put it very bluntly, we have technologies to manufacture an enlightened being. Western societies talk of political, social and physical liberation, but we have always understood liberation as the core value of who we are, the ultimate liberation. It is time for Bharat to establish itself once again as a land of spirituality beyond religion, spirituality beyond sectarianism, and spirituality as a process that is relevant to every human being.
(Sadhguru is a yogi, mystic, visionary and a New York Times bestselling author)
