Of the rare free will

 
 By Vijay Phanshikar :
“I am no bird; and no net ensnares me: 
I am a free human being with an 
independent will.”
- Charlotte Brontë. 
ANOTHER definition of libertarianism !
Independent will !!
Wow !!!     

However, this is easier said than achieved -- or lived. For, independent will is a Divine gift that we all possess, so to say. Yet, very few of us realise that we truly have such a gift from the Divine. In the mundaneness of living, in the vagaries of dailiness of life, we become victims of so much of petty things and thoughts that we lose the track of the Divine and its gifts. So, when a Charlotte Brontë speaks of being truly free human being with an independent will, she underlines in paradox that an awareness of such a possession is rather a rarity. Most of us, most commonly, do philosophise that free will is what marks the humans differently from other living species. Yet, very rarely do we stop and ponder over the definition of ‘free will’.

 

And that is the problem. But in its rightest of meanings, ‘free will’ symbolises a very fine human mind capable of removing from its folds many encumbrances that afflict free thought and free spirit, and think in the most liberated manner without the bondage or baggage of past experience and conditioning that actually stop individual persons from thinking truly freely. Most of us are afflicted more by memory from the past rather than invited by immense possibilities of unencumbered free will that refuses to weigh down by negativism. Many of us do insist, like Charlotte Brontë did, I am no bird; and no net ensnares me. But such assertions are more of a bravado than a realism. In actuality, we are almost always trapped under the debris of our prejudices and prides and biases and blights. So, when a young man offered Christ his shoulders to ride on and enter his hometown, the Messiah said ‘no’. He said, he did not want to ride anything that had been ridden before.

 

Angrily, the young man said, in effect, ‘Oh, I am sorry, but nobody had ridden me before’. Christ smiled and said in a soft tone, in effect, ‘Brother, your pride and prejudice have been riding you.’ That is where a claimed ‘free will’ comes under question. That is when one may realise one’s limitation truly to have a will that can be described as ‘free’. So, when Charlotte Brontë insists, no net ensnares me, she is talking of true liberation of her will which she can marshal into any fluid thought without any entrapment. True, human beings are gifted with free will. But in true sense, free will is something of a very rare phenomenon, very rare happening. Most of us, thus, remain snared by our cluttered mind that is nearly fully incapable of free thought -- and, therefore, free will.