Feeding the Tree of Liberty



"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants." - Thomas Jefferson.

The modern American conception of freedom and liberty is so infused with patriotic passion, restless energy and good vibes that most of us view freedom as an end of itself. The desire burning in all of us is to be free, full stop. The thoughts of what we'd do with our freedom are often vague in the extreme, and that's if we even have them at all. For much of my life, freedom has been the light at the end of tunnel, something that's much easier to reach for than to define.

What I've been much better at defining is what I seek freedom from. To be free from debt. To be free from my commute and my cubicle. To be free from the worries and stresses of eking out a living. Each of these "froms" gives me a specific target: pay off that crushing mortgage, replace that job, hit that financial threshold.

The visceral presence of a barrier to your freedom is enormously motivating. That six-figured number laughing at you on your monthly mortgage statement. That two-hour staff meeting that cheerily promises to keep on going until you retire. That chip reader at the super-market checkout reminding you that you escape this system at your own family's risk. However softened by the glow of technology and enlightened civilization, the aggravation of these impositions is the seed of liberty.

When I realize my desire for freedom was born out of anger and resentment over the present state of my life, the Thomas Jefferson quote above took on a new meaning. My tree of liberty was like the carnivorous plant from The Little Shop of Horrors, craving the blood of my various tyrants as well as my own blood, sweat and tears. Feed me Seymour!

Not that this is a bad thing - chainsawing my mortgage into digestible chunks is a great feeling. So was shoving my once two-hour commute into the meat grinder. I'm just now getting the knives ready for the dead horse that is my current career path. There is a limit, however, to the usefulness of negative motivation.

Any tyrant specific enough to motivate is specific enough to die and rob you of that motivation. Like my feeling for my six-figured mortgage, the rage Inigo Montoya harbored for his six-fingered man drove him to extraordinary lengths. But killing Count Rugen extinguished his inner fire and left him lost and adrift.

The eminently followable Mark B., describing life after debt, experienced a similar phenomenon on Twitter:
Strange for something that we moved heaven and earth to make happen, the process of trading in hated tyrants for vague aspirations can be demotivating, disorienting and even depressing. As Mark said, the chase is over. An infinite horizon induces something like paralysis. The tree of liberty, grown strong on the blood of patriots and tyrants, stagnates, its leaves now dull and flaccid.

I'm still getting my feet wet on the other side of this process, but I believe the key to recapturing the magic motivation power of the freedom "froms" for the freedom "tos" is keeping up with the bloodthirsty diet. Just as Inigo found second life as the new swashbuckling Dread Pirate Roberts, so must the ravenous carnivorous version of yourself that gorged on your debt find a new prey. This does not mean returning to negative emotional motivators, but finding the positive expressions of those same impulses.

What are those positive expressions and where can they be found? Tune in for Part II (The Conquest of Your New World) next Thursday.

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