Choice between Freedom and Comfort
If the choice is between Freedom or Comfort -what will you choose?
Well, if the question was put to me when I was growing up, I would have chosen comfort (though grudgingly).
Today, I may chose Freedom with a bit of comfort attached to it.
Why am I deliberating this subject anyway.
Before I get to the why, let me take you to Tallinn, capital city of Estonia. Estonia is one of the few countries from the erstwhile soviet union to join European Union.
It is a small city with 159 km radius and just around 500 k population. 45% of the population in Tallinn speak Russian.
I visited this city as part of the stop over in the Baltic Cruise.It is a small city which preserves the history well. While the highlights of the city can be found through Google, I would like to discuss about my conversation with the tour guide Julia.
Julia was very enthusiastic and friendly lady. She possesses quite exhaustive knowledge about the city and its history. Her command over English which is an added attraction beside her pleasant appearance.
One of the fellow tourist asked her about the transition experience from soviet regime to the free market economy. She explained the amount of work the new government did in handing over the properties back to the respective owners, disputes that followed and the resolutions that emerged. It all took several years.
“Can you explain the life during soviet time?”. another tourist asked.
“It also had good aspects” she continued “People got all the basic necessities without spending much. Housing was free, everyone was assured a job that will give them decent salary, good enough for them to buy bread not that they had other choices. People had more time to study. Art and Literature were given more time as TV programs were made available only for 2 hours. Education and Health was taken care by the government. There was no need for people to take loans from banks and spend their lives in only repaying the mortgage. It definitely had its negative aspects, however one cannot dismiss it as completely bad”
As the tour finished, I asked Julia “Given a choice, what would you choose, freedom that you enjoy today or the comfort that you had in the Soviet regime”
Julia Smiled and said “I will choose Today. The freedom that we have today despite the struggles to earn a decent living, will outweigh all the comforts that were present in those times”
Extending this a bit to our daily life, we choose to remain in the comfort zone in our lives. There is no other force that stops us from moving out of the comfort zone.
Move out with freedom and experience the outer limits or for that matter extend the outer limits.
We get what is necessary in the comfort zone.
But no. Don’t stay there. Move out of the comfort zone.
Challenge the limits.
Break free of the self- imposed boundary.
Experience the freedom.
Unleash the creativity that can propel us to the pinnacle.
The question is What will be our choice?
