Quotes About Freedom

These are the outstanding questions that arise when we look at the human aspect of freedom, the longing for submission, and the lust for power: What is freedom as a human experience? Is the desire for freedom something inherent in human nature?

If human beings are ever to become free and to cease feeding industry by pathological consumption, a radical change in the economic system is necessary: we must put an end to the present situation where a healthy economy is possible only at the price of unhealthy human beings. The task is to construct a healthy economy for healthy people.

I have stressed the psychological side of freedom, but I have also tried to show that the psychological problem cannot be separated from the material basis of human existence, from the economic, social, and political structure of society.

T]o the extent to which an individual is potent, that is, able to realize his potentialities on the basis of freedom and integrity of his self, he does not need to dominate and is lacking the lust for power.

Desde el nacimiento hasta la muerte, de lunes a lunes, de la mañana a la noche: todas las actividades están rutinizadas y prefabricadas. ¿Cómo puede un hombre preso en esa red de actividades rutinarias recordar que es un hombre, un individuo único, al que sólo le ha sido otorgada una única oportunidad de vivir, con esperanzas y desilusiones, con dolor y temor, con el anhelo de amar y el miedo a la nada y a la separatidad?

Modern political democracy, if it restricts itself to the purely political sphere, cannot sufficiently counteract the results of the economic insignificance of the average individual. But purely economic concepts like socialization

destroy his freedom and the integrity of his individual self.9

Tragedija svih velikih religija je da one krše i izopa?uju same principe slobode ?im postanu masovne organizacije, kojima vlada religiozna birokratija.

All three negative utopias make it appear that it is possible to dehumanize man completely, and yet for life to go on.

Invidia, gelosia, ambizione, bramosia, sono passioni; l'amore è un'azione, un potere umano che può essere praticato solo in libertà, e non è la conseguenza si una costrizione.

Protestantism and Calvinism, while giving expression to a new feeling of freedom, at the same time constituted an escape from the burden of freedom

This book is a continuation of Escape from Freedom , written over fifteen years ago. In Escape from Freedom I tried to show that the totalitarian movements appealed to a deep-seated craving to escape from the freedom man had achieved in the modern world; that modern man, free from medieval ties, was not free to build a meaningful life based on reason and love, hence sought new security in submission to a leader, race or state.

Sex no longer frightens people; it can no longer be used to develop a sense of guilt, and thereby to force submission.

Todos son completamente libres, siempre que no interfieran con los derechos legítimos de los demás.

Prometeu nu se supune, dar nici nu se simte vinovat.

We have become automatons who live under the illusion of being self-willing individuals.

the understanding of the reasons for the totalitarian flight from freedom is a premise for any action which aims at the victory over the totalitarian forces.

Cuanto más nos liberemos del afán de poseer en todas sus formas, en especial de nuestro egocentrismo, menos poderoso será el miedo a la muerte, ya que no tendremos nada que perder.

Solo en la medida en que la práctica de la vida se vea libre de sus contradicciones y de su irracionalidad, el mapa podrá corresponder a su realidad.

Man—man and woman—can create by planting seeds, by producing material objects, by creating art, by creating ideas, by loving one another. In the act of creation man transcends himself as a creature, raises himself beyond the passivity and accidentalness of his existence into the realm of purposefulness and freedom. In man's need for transcendence lies one of the roots for love, as well as for art, religion and material production.

Hatred is a passionate wish for destruction; love is a passionate affirmation of an object; it is not an affect but an active striving and inner relatedness, the aim of which is the happiness, growth, and freedom of its object. It is a readiness which, in principle, can turn to any person and object including ourselves.

The newly won freedom appears as a curse; he is free from the sweet bondage of paradise, but he is not free to govern himself, to realize his individuality.

It is not enough that men are not slaves; if social conditions further the existence of automatons, the result will not be love of life, but love of death.

In reality, this attitude of concentrated meditation is the highest activity there is, an activity of the soul, which is possible only under the condition of inner freedom and independence.