When I started getting inspired for this article, at first I wanted to entitle it "Modern Slavery". And then one day I typed that phrase into Google and realized I should not use it because... actually the slavery we've known from the history books, tv and movies - it does still exist, and there are still millions of people worldwide suffering, being used for different lucrative purposes. Lucrative for their masters of course, but not for them. And this is actually not the type of slavery I wanted to write about today...
My first inspiration came when I was reading a book written by a former slave Frederick Douglass: "Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave". We've all seen those scenes in the movies already, but reading it from a "first-hand" source - it's a different kind of experience I think. And believe me, what you cannot see in the movie is the actual thoughts, feelings, sufferings, the real impact the slavery has on their victims, forever...
Reading about the "physical" slavery suddenly made me think of the "mental" one that we often experience in the modern times. The trap, or the traps we are put in, or that we actually sometimes put ourselves in. I think there are many of them. And each of us could think of the ones he/she is in. Today I will share with you about a few I've noticed around me.
Work.
As long as you are not an entrepreneur, working only for your own account and reporting only to yourself - you somehow remain in the master-slave relationship with your employer. And this is mostly felt in the big corporations, when people in the bottom of the hierarchy have no decision power, they are there just to respond to the orders, to meet the requirements, they're just one of the many pieces in the whole corporate machine. Sometimes you might feel like changing it, changing the world almost, you're trying to propose something new and then you just hit the wall made of people for whom changes are not good, not necessary, cause the "old" is still good and enough.
Relationships
You choose him/her - with your heart, not your reason.
You fall in love - too quickly.
You make plans for the future - so fast?
You move in together - too early.
And then you realize you're in a trap. You're in the chains of that person's love, or whatever that is. Because if you feel more like a prisoner than a happy person - that it cannot be love. And then it gets hard to get out of it, to liberate yourself. You're having mixed feelings, you don't feel courageous enough, you don't feel strong enough. That's normal. We all have to get weak in order to get stronger when the D-Day comes. And that day will finally come. And you will be able to start a new life. Yes, really, you can trust me on that.
Rules
A friend of mine once told me: "I feel like a prisoner of our society".
Who made up all those rules we need to obey every day? All those laws, regulations, prescriptions and prohibitions? Who decided there would be borders between the countries? Who said we all need to have passports and even visas, cause otherwise there's no way we can travel around the world? The World which was created billions of years ago, created free and for free. And when you see it today... It's incredible how some people turned everything upside down, how they disrespected the Mother Nature and all the treasures she has so kindly offered us...
Thoughts
And last but not least - we do easily get trapped in and by our minds. We overthink. We overanalyze. We worry too much. We predict something bad will happen, although we have usually no solid reason to think that. We basically let our thoughts eat us from the inside. We let them put us in bed for the whole day (or days) just to watch the ceiling in the bedroom and separate us from the outside world, family and friends.
So...
Now that we can do basically whatever we want, are we not slaves anymore...?
