The Freedom Of Choice And Its Consequences

Freedom means different things to different people. In this article I want to talk about one kind of freedom. The freedom of choice and its consequences. I want to approach the feeling of freedom from a slightly different angle.

I was invited by @soyunasantacruz and here I take the opportunity to write an article for @JonicaBradley's Writing Promt #1 Freedom.

Being content in life means different things to different people, because each person has different needs for contentment. There is the so-called eternal malcontent, who is not satisfied with anything, that happens to them in life, and there is the one, who can be happy with every little thing, so that it seems, that all their desires have been fulfilled and they are satisfied with everything they have been given.

How can I be content in life if life involves constantly growing, evolving and changing? How is this possible and what does it depend on?

Do you know the story that happened to Albert Einstein? One day he went to work and one of his colleagues asked him. Why do you have only one shirt? The physicist was shocked and he responded. What makes you think that? I have 50 shirts. So how come you wear the same shirt every day? His colleague asked. I do have 50 shirts, but they all look the same.

After this statement, now his colleague was surprised. But why? He asked. Because I don't want to spend my time and energy choosing my shirts every morning, because I have more important things to do. Einstein replied.

So the question is, how can we be content while our freedom of choice is expanding. There's been research on this, 100 years after Albert Einstein's story, a psychology professor went into a shop to buy jeans.

He told the salesman, give me a pair of jeans, please. The shop assistant asked him. Okay, but which one? Puzzled, the professor replied. Give me the one you had, when there was only one kind. The salesman gave him the jeans.

The professor sat down at home and began to wonder what had happened to him. He found that given the choice, he was embarrassed and began to feel anxious. But when he asked for the one they had, when there was only one kind, he calmed down.

Psychology had not researched this phenomenon at the time and the professor started to think about it and do research.

People would think, that when you have more choice, you get the freedom of having something to choose from, then more satisfaction comes from that. In fact, that is not the case. Research has shown just the opposite.

The majority of people are unhappier than before, even though their freedom has increased. Very few people achieve the greater happiness associated with increased freedom. It follows, that freedom does not make us happy. What do we need to be happy with freedom?

What is the reason why, while we are happy with the freedom of choice we have, we are not content? The process of choice itself is one of increasing anxiety. Our lives are full of choices and we have a lot of decisions to make. These are the choices we want to make for ourselves.

This will lead to a lot of anxiety. If I am free to choose something, I want to make the best possible choice and I am anxious about whether I am making the right choice and with that comes higher expectations. Consider the following.

Someone invites you somewhere and you go and take part, but you tell yourself I can't wear anything, look any way, act any way and so on. Your demands on yourself also increase. As our needs increase, life has less and less positive responses to our increased level of need.

In the old days, especially in countries where there was communism, there was not much choice, yet there were queues outside the shops. People didn't have to make decisions about which of a particular product to buy. However, if my expectations are high, life cannot give me positive answers therefore disappointment is almost guaranteed.

I don't want to buy just anything, because I have so much freedom of choice, I just want the best, just the perfect product. If I get that, then life has lived up to my expectations, but if I don't, then I'm disappointed.

Let's look at this in a little more detail. Suppose you want a new smart phone. The best one for you. After a long series of decisions, you finally have it in your hands and you're happy to use it, because you've got what you've been longing for.

What happens six months later? A newer and better smart phone comes out and, what's more, you can buy it at a promotional price, cheaper than yours. Imagine having the second best phone in your pocket and you're not happy because now there is a newer, better, faster and cheaper one out there. You're disappointed. It happens to most people.

Sometimes less is more. I think greed takes a little part of this situation too. In this modern world we have so many things to choose from and we are so overwhelmed by that. So don't let this confusion come over you. Find your own freedom by keep it simple and be happy with it.

Lead Image Source: Unsplash