Learning about freedom from Leonard Cohen

What is it to be actually free?

Through some scratches of what I had become aware of, there are several degrees in freedom; physical, actions, and thoughts. You're free physically when your body is not constrained to some kind of boundaries i.e., you're not incarcerated. A degree higher is when you're free to do the actions you want to do, you can grab something to eat if you feel like it. The last one and the ultimate aim is to fully realize why you're doing what you're doing.

I imagine upon realizing this, Sartre became spooked out himself and decided to come to terms, that men are condemned to be free. Because we cannot fathom how big of freedom we all actually have. Those of us who are failed to realize that we are actually free eventually turned to what he called 'bad faith' - simply blaming something that is not there for our own inadequacies.

But you might argue, it's not that simple. We are never really that free, are we? We are bound to our own responsibilities as part of society. Our freedom also bounded by the freedom of others.

This is when Spinoza famously said, 'the free will is only illusion'.

Well, anyway.

It's the question that I don't think will ever fade out. All this progress we have made in philosophy, politics, psychology, all at the end offer a distant consolation. For really, the condition is much more fluid, never in one size fits all. Not in everyone, not even in one's entire lifetime. Or even year, week, days.

One really has to localize the context to one's own surroundings and settle, in their own way, to be free. And have enough wisdom to accept or change it.

For the reason, I'd like to think why Leonard Cohen came out with the lines and sang,

Like a bird on the wire 

Like a drunk in a midnight choir

I have tried in my way to be free

We all try, we all do. And sometimes, that's all that matters.