I stretched my hands,
I stretched them straight and freely.
I moved my wrists slowly,
I moved them carefully.
I moved my neck,
I moved my feet.
I thought,
“Is this what it means to wake up free?”
‘What it means to wake up free’ was meant for February 1st, the Abolition of Slavery in Mauritius. I had forgotten, but thought it would be relevant to post this anytime really. I realised that the Independence Day of Mauritius is next Saturday, on March 12th, which falls well for this post’s topic; freedom.
Dear Patient Reader,
“What does it mean to wake up free?”
A question I thought of and then thought over for a few minutes, months ago. First, I thought that that kind of freedom, the one that we all have, means waking up on our own terms. Not having someone owning you and your body, like that of a slave. Not having someone who defines how you do things, and when and how you do them. What we say, nor how we react and respond. To have the space of mind to be ourselves. That kind of freedom, the one that we all have, is to have the right and ownership over our time. We decide when we get up, whether we’ll go to work or not today, how we do things. When we’ll eat and drink, when we’ll go to sleep every night.
Slavery is defined as “the state of being under the control of another person; subjection and subjugation, forced submission to control by others.”[1] Slave owners owned hands, backs, and feet, and what remained were hearts and minds. What they could not control was the human mind. They would weaken them, yes, deplete the strength of their physical bodies. The mind would weaken, yes, for many. But for many others, subjugation only increased the resistance that was growing inside, somewhere at the very top, where a lot of the neurons were. And where an organ pumped blood through their body. Where their heart resided, the place that feels like where your mind resides during boiling hot emotion. At some point, that built-up resistance would burst, either leading to their eventual freedom or death. Either way, slave owners had not owned minds, only physical bodies. In ‘Get Out’, a 2017 American horror film, the bodies of African-American individuals are used for the immortality of the other. Taking away the brain, the mind of someone is taking away that person from himself or herself, from their body. All you’re left with is a functioning shell they can use. You can control the mind through brainwashing, propaganda, and extremism. Though that wasn’t so prevalent during slavery, it came later during consecutive global and civil wars.
Freedom is living free of prejudice, or rather living free from the harmful effects of prejudice. It falls into the complicated mix of waking up free, a chance which only a global minority have. While the global majority are not free, either due to poverty, religion, and negative politics (social groups who make decisions and who distribute that authority[2]). Or, due to the very confinements they themselves built into their minds. We are all liberal or illiberal, but all free and living in our liberty. Freedom is “understood as having the ability to act or change without limitation, or to have the resources to carry out our purposes.”[3] Freedom is to build our conscience, and to have the right to enact it. It’s hard to think of the world we live in without any oppression or authority. It’s all we’ve ever seen, heard of, or known. Would there be chaos if oppression and authority, active entities that “keep us all in line” didn’t exist? Or would we know how to live peacefully?
To wake up free is to wake up to your circadian clock, a biological clock that you built into you over time. It is to wake up to your alarm clock, to stretch your arms, yawn, scratch your head. To draw the curtains and to drink a glass of warm water. And to get on with your day.
Till the next.
P.S. My young cousin learnt to say “Oh yes darling” in English, and it is the cutest thing.
P.P.S. The next post is titled “Why are people scared of thunder?”
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