Freedom

I can picture a school Veterans’ Day program with a student speaker reading (in gender neutral terminology) their essay entitled, “What freedom means to me.” Freedom is naturally a quality of living that concerns every human being in one way or another and there are different “freedoms” one can discuss.  This blog might very well explore freedom in various contexts because who knows where our minds will take us in this adventure called, “Figuring out how to be the best human I can,” a fine life purpose as far as I’m concerned. Others may beg to differ.

 On this Monday morning I was revisiting the music from yesterday’s worship service. I play piano, organ and direct music ensembles. I started out the day with a tired brain. Not surprisingly, I made more mistakes than usual. I always play at least SOME wrong notes. I still received a compliment and I don’t stress out about wrong notes as my purpose is not to play with perfect accuracy. My purpose is to communicate the message of the music through playing musically. That doesn’t mean accuracy doesn’t matter because it’s pretty hard to experience a musical message when the melody and harmonies are buried by wrong notes!

I used to be much more concerned about playing ALL the right notes because yes, I am a recovering perfectionist. I realized I don’t beat myself up as much as I one time would have. I feel FREE to make some mistakes in the process of making something good. Some of the credit goes to our congregation which has so many members that are kind, caring, accepting and positive. If you’ve spent any amount of time with people who are negative and always or overly critical in a destructive rather than constructive way, you know how that leeches you of your self-worth and gets in the way of doing and being your best.

Accepting that I am a flawed human being that will never actually attain perfection, which doesn’t mean I can’t and won’t strive for it, allows me the freedom to make mistakes without experiencing lower self worth. My dignity remains intact. Acknowledging mistakes I make keeps me humble and I avoid the urge to feel “superior” to others. We all hate to admit we just might fall into a sense of superiority as the next person, but it’s true. I believe it might just be the most common human weakness, believing that we are worth more than some other humans because we are (fill in the blank.)

Feeling more humble, I am more likely to admit my mistakes out loud and ask forgiveness as needed. When I discover that a person can’t actually die of humility, or even humiliation, I might be more willing to forgive mistakes others make, even if they don’t ask for it. If you ever learn more about forgiveness you find out it is of great benefit to the self, even more than it does for the other.  Forgiveness can be freeing!

Where does this type of freedom lead? Certainly to better health as we let go of the stress and wear and tear to our psyche. I believe it also leads us to be better to the people around us as we gain understanding, compassion and empathy. It is one of the stepping stones to becoming the person the Creator created us to be, the best version of ourselves.

Imagine where we can go from there!

Please feel welcome to share your own stories in the comments or chat.