Given the example of patients and doctors and prescriptions, freedom of choice becomes an oxymoron when choices are given to individuals who are not trained or prepared to make an intelligent decision. Whilst Dan Ariely talked about irrational decision making, Barry Schwartz illustrates how having choices end up limiting individuals rather than empowering them.
ready or not, some consider it a given that the options are infinite anyway…
There’s a fine line between having a mind open to possibilities and a mind that abdicates responsibility in the name of “infinite possibilities”.
The former will always be critical of the givens, the latter will refuse to think.
“New age” thinking is prone to this fine dichotomy. People normally slip into new age first questioning their status quo, only to settle into complacency and preferring simply to be passively “open to the universe” and end up achieving nothing.
Being an active participant in change and possibility is always the superior option. Make the decision, create the possibility, and avoid overcomplexity for its own sake.
all the way back in history, when people didn’t have a particular thing, they invented it. one invention after another, and we’ve got all the stuff to choose from, systems were created because of the lot. these were the creators of and in this world, for better or for worse. and there were wise people, too, who found cures for disease where they thought there were none. these fall in the category of taking “possibilities” into their own hands, not to know the world, but to change it. not to merely know their circumstances, but to improve on it. that’s pretty much the difference between academic and managerial/business research. academics just want to know. business research want changes.
people think, if there’s no way, create that way, and this is were infinite thinking helps much. as you say, “create the possibility.” more like, it’s possible, just match that possibility, and it’s yours. law of cause and effect. just like negative thinking, or whatever is the mental habit, matching circumstances are sure to find it before we even begin to realize the habit.
new age thinking? hmmm. being “open to the universe,” the way you put it, begs the question WHY? why are you being open to the universe right now? there must be a reason. BUT if the answer to that must come from “the universe” as well, then you know that this person is better of snapping out of this way of thinking. if you know why you’re being open to the universe, then we give you the benefit of the doubt, of course. these particular new age thinkers must be reminded that the mental journey “out there” really points to the universe within. that’s new age 101. just must be reminded of their own basics.
^ I guess the essential point about the paradigm I am criticizing is that it supplants initiative with “possibility”–which is an oxymoron.
Possibility is a concept, but what actually occurs is a result of causality, of action. One “creates” the possibility by making a choice and acting on it.
Being “open to the universe” is an oxymoron, since it begs inaction as a substitute for action, in the guise of “entertaining possibilities”.
Maybe “being open to the universe” is like “bahala na,” which stems from “bathala na.” Could also be a “wait and see,” or a “stepping back from an immersion.” Some people have had eureka moments when this is done in good spirits. One could get too controlling about some things, too, and “being open to the universe” could be a “breather” or a way to “loosen up” or “balance out” about it because “something better I haven’t sensed or perceived could turn up.”
well… I do hope that somewhere in the too many choices, somebody comes up with a pig farm vibrator that helps to induce labor to the female pigs. otherwise… I do gladly step back from immersing myself in those thoughts for now.
“Freedom is not a reaction: freedom is not choice.
It is man’s pretence that because he has choice he is free.
Freedom is pure observation without direction, without fear of punishment and reward.
Freedom is without motive; freedom is not at the end of the evolution of man
but lies in the first step of his existence.
In observation one begins to discover the lack of freedom.
Freedom is found in the choiceless awareness of our daily existence and activity.” ~ Jiddu Krishnamurti
Hallo Jason. Years ago Krishnamurti resonated with my thoughts on freedom. How come, I asked myself, do most of us think of freedom in terms of opposites and aversions that it is mostly “Freedom From” (conditional Freedom) than it is simply the “Freedom” that casts no tall shadows. “Freedom From” can work when making decisions, but when the time comes when no matter how much we have avoided, distanced, secured, chosen and migrated, we still find no joy or peace, no real freedom, that is, it is perhaps because we have sought for Freedom in the wrong places (personal). Of course, as a community, we have contributions to make to alleviate pain or cause a sense of Freedom for all. However, what Krishnamurti means is Unconditional Freedom, and such that is in alignment with what he calles the unnamed and unnameable.
Yes, the very pursuit for freedom can enslave us, hence as K said, “freedom is not choice”.
Man always thinks that the more choices he has, the more liberated he feels – like that typical saying, “Freedom of choice”.
Man has not realised that to have no choice whatsoever is the absolute freedom. Unfortunately, we have all been conditioned since birth to choose one thing or the other and not to say, “Keep your options, I’m fine as I am!”
I think the question is, “what do I want?” and “who am I?” amidst the too many choices that don’t depend on how scant or plentiful the choices.