So many of us are tied down by our psychology - our desires, obsessions, jealousies, fears, and much more. It clouds everything we do, think and say. And it’s insidious. It’s barely possible to see or feel it. The mind keeps finding excuses to hide it away from you, to justify its thoughts to you, to keep you under the same veil it has used all its life to protect itself and stay alive.

But lack of psychological freedom, by which I mean the lack of that afraid voice that’s constantly trying to protect you because it’s not sure it’s got what it takes, is freeing. Yes, a good education, family, support system, resources, job, they’re all important and do make a difference. But I’ve realized until you’re free of the need to constantly protect yourself from the outside world, from others, it’s hard to be your best self.

Easier said than done. Our world constantly tells us we’re not good enough, we don’t have what it takes, we need to be afraid, we need to be better. I see it with many of my friends, with myself. Even if you know that it doesn’t need to be that way, even if you constantly explain it to yourself, it doesn’t stick. You eat yourself.

But as cheesy as it sounds I am understanding that all it takes is love. The love to life. And it is easy. Yes ideally you get a full stock of it growing up, but otherwise it’s as simple as loving yourself by teaching yourself how to explore, how to create, how to feel. It seems moot at first, but persisting at it, it becomes easy. You start wanting it. You start becoming your best friend.

And once that happens, there’s little that can hold you back. You become that unstoppable force because you learn there isn’t much out there that wants to stop you. The world wants you to go, wants you to exist, wants you to happen. Most of all, you want to happen. Obstacles start becoming nuisances.

Then, you become free.

So if you feel stuck, if you realize you feel angry more than you feel engaged, if you feel burnt out, if you haven’t gone into that flow start in a while - go out there and explore. Try something new. Walk around in a new neighborhood, try a new skill, hang out with a community you normally wouldn’t, cook a new dish, play a new sport. And try small snippets of a few. You’ll see you get a feeling you haven’t had in a while. One that feeds your soul.

As new age as this post sounds, I’ve experienced enough of it for it to be real (at least for me). And this reality might be the most important of it all.

Being free, being loving, being you.