I Wanna be Free, I Wanna be Me

By Daxx Bondoc

There are a lot of people who have the “I-wanna-be-free-I-wanna-be-me” mentality. Their ultimate goal in life is “to be themselves”, whatever that means. 

This is can be very problematic in our “fallen” world. 

There are two big problems in this mentality. First is the word “free”. What most of us consider freedom is actually abuse of freedom. Modern man’s idea of freedom is doing anything you want. That is not freedom that is license. Freedom has boundaries. You are not free to murder or steal. 

Many people like to use the word “freedom” so they can be free to be selfish. They like to do whatever fancies them, at all cost. Like a father or a mother who wants to be “free” from his/her family. So they leave their families to pursue their personal happiness. That is not freedom that is abandonment. 

Another problematic part of that mentality is the “me”. Modern man in general has no clue who he is. He is fashioned by his environment, especially by the media. It is the same media who educates the masses that being a fallen human being is normal. And to strive to be the human God created us to be is psychologically problematic. 

Our idea of “me” will be probably egoistic. Our “me-attitude” can be sum up to “It is all about me and to hell with the rest.” 

Our idea of our humanity is very selfish. It is all about getting what we want. 

But that is not who we are. 

We were created to love. To forget ourselves in love. God created us to have a “We” attitude and not a “Me” attitude. Selfishness is the total opposite of our humanity. 

It is same with freedom. God gave us freedom not to be selfish, but to love. Only free people can love. A selfish person is not free to love because he cannot love anyone else but himself. It takes great freedom to love, for most of us are slaves of our fears and selfishness. 

“Freedom consists not in doing what we like, but in having the right to do what we ought.” -Pope John Paul II 

Jesus was the freest man who ever lived, for He was God. But Jesus spent His life doing the Father’s will and not His own. 

“Yet not my will, but yours be done.” Luke 22:42 

If we want to be really “free” and to be really “me”, we must start defining freedom and ourselves by God’s standards and not of the world’s. 

So how do we do it? 

We must love God with all our being, and love our neighbor as ourselves. 

The ultimate act of freedom is to love. 

The fulfillment of our humanity is love as well. 

So be free to give your “me” to love.