liberation and freedom are a lot of work

yesterday, i had an excellent breakfast with mike leyba. near the end of our convo, i started talking through a theory that has been developing for me this week. i certainly don’t mean that this is a unique theory as i probably have read about it somewhere before but it’s landing for me in a new way this week and so it feels important to write down:

1. liberation and freedom are hard work: imo, a misguided (american?) understanding of the word freedom is ability to do whatever one wants all the time. definitions of freedom that make more sense to me are being in right relationship with yourself and those around you.

2. it takes a lot of work to work together: in the business world, the reason most orgs use hierarchy is because it’s damn efficient. collective, participatory decision making processes take a lot of energy. in theory, the reaosn they’re worth it is because the outcomes actually work for everyone instead of just working for some. if the outcomes are better in the end, the energy it took to get to consensus will have been worth it.

3. there isn’t a 1:1 trade of between doing things we like and things we don’t: for example, when i go to an hour meeting that i don’t want to versus spending an hour with someone i love, the energy trade is no equivalent. when i go to the meeting, not only do i use that energy in the meeting, but (because i didn’t want to be there), i’m extra drained. if i had spent the time with someone i love, i would have probably ended the hour with more energy, some new thoughts, and a deeper connection.

4. the extra energy we get from following our pleasure and doing the things we love is necessary: in fact, the more i see and read about adrienne’s pleasure activism thread), the more i’m beginning to believe that repression is directly linked to our inability to move effectively towards liberation. our repression keeps us from having the energy we need to do the extra work of being liberated (or, maybe “of being liberation”). when we follow our pleasure, we enter generative energy cycles and that extra energy is what we need to keep doing the hard work of figuring out how to be together.

theory overview complete. there’s more to it than that, but those are the high points. now to get to testing…

ps - i just went to adrienne’s blog to hyperlink her pleasure activism blog tag and saw this line at the end of the post she published today:

i choose pleasure and liberation.

you?

what a question…

words / writing / post-processing
385w / 13min / 17min