To freedom we can attach the expectation that we can always decide ourselves, can always realize what comes to mind. As a result, many believe that they need more money to become free, because the money will empower them to do the things they dream of. Others believe that they cannot be free, as long as they live from hand to mouth, because they must continue to sell their time to employers in order to keep on going with their life. In that case it does also not help when they turn over a lot of money and consume excessively. Some feel trapped in their every day duties. Others believe to be free because they chose the way of life they currently live. This difference in judgement of personal freedom is possible to be seen for two individuals who, looking from the outside, appear to live a very similar life. Even the same person can feel free on one day and trapped the next day. Is freedom an illusion, or a matter of perspective?
If I believe that I can buy freedom and happiness with money, then I will invest my time and energy into obtaining money. If I believe that I can not live without this money, or could not fulfill my duties towards other people without this money, then I will feel forced to invest my time and energy into earning money. When I realize that neither freedom nor happiness can be bought, but only be achieved by thinking independently for myself, by recognizing my own nature and by spending time together with others, then I will invest my time and energy in my own development, my own ability to think, in getting to know myself and of course directly in other people who are important to me. Children, bur also adults benefit more of time and attention than they do of representative consumer goods.
As humans we cannot gain orientation in the same way a computer would attempt to gain it. The evaluation of huge amounts of data is not a good way for a human to discover truth. An additional problem of this method is that as a source of data often observation results or measurements of third parties are used, or even news articles and reports. To get an overview of the world based on this information is difficult. So much is happening, there are so many accusations, excuses, claims, studies, and so much of it is contradictory. Who is right? What really happens in the world? Who are the good ones and who are the bad ones, the empire or the rebels?
Truth and freedom are closely attached. Only when I am interested in truth for the main pillars of my world view can I become free. If I prioritize conformity or avoid to put time and effort into thinking myself, then it will be difficult to become free. Truth is not simply given to us in todays world. We live in an age of lies, and if we have an interest in truth, we must discover it ourselves. Especially the big lies, despite getting constantly exposed, are the ones that last the longest. Depending on what concept, what Vorstellung we connect with the words freedom and democracy, we consider them represented well by our society and government or we do not. It is not impossible to become free in our society. But freedom is not simply given to us in the modern world.
Many words have been stripped of their meaning, turned upside down or made hollow. What is considered environmentally friendly nowadays has little to do with its impact on the environment. As long as there is a paper that certifies climate neutrality, everyone seems happy. And those papers use very creative calculations, and get their relevance from a very creative climate model. The environment suffers. That is just one example of many. We have access to so much information, we are trashed with numbers, data and facts until it seems impossible to distill any truth out of this chaos. Luckily this will not be necessary. The truth we will find neither in the internet nor in newspapers, but within ourselves. We are a part of the world and we have a better access to it than what we get from our technological infrastructure. We just need to learn to use this ability again. Then we can become free.
Of course this will not enable us to instantly make a conclusive judgement about the truth of any story that is told to us. But it becomes easier to identify a lie. We will notice quicker what intentions are motivating the distribution of a story. We can sort all the little details into a bigger picture and as a result can identify a lot as an attempt to distract us with irrelevant, imaginary or made-up information. Which of those three alternatives applies is in most cases not important.
Freedom means to have orientation derived from my own understanding, my knowledge of who I am. It means sourcing my life purpose from within instead of choosing it from a list of options given by the outside world. Freedom means to live consciously and think my own thoughts. That must be learned and requires training. Free humans do also adjust their behavior to their surroundings. But they are aware of it, and although they will play along one or two unpleasant games, they steadily work towards realizing what matters to them.