My fifteen year old daughter walked into the room as I pondered the many definitions of the word – Freedom. What does she feel it means? Upon asking, I received these answers: no more constrictions, being set free, finding yourself, no more chains and lastly, to have a clear mind.
Putting her on the spot like I did, she voiced some impressive descriptions. The answers were not flippant. To be carelessly tossed out. The wheels turned in her head. All of her being focused on illustration.
When I observed her demonstration of the first meaning – no more constrictions – Olivia had used her hands to show a space in the air that was small then enlarged. As though she went from holding a baseball to a beach ball.
With freedom comes movement. Just like the flow between her non-constricted hands. They had to move, had to show motion—expansion.
Olivia’s last example – to have a clear mind – grabbed me. Yes! What freedom that is! Is there movement with that form of freedom too? Absolutely. To be surrounded by chaos and turmoil can produce a place of torment in our minds that stifles to the point of immobility. When that bondage is broken, dark turns to light as a shifting happens—movement! Clarity, inspiration, awakening, freedom….
Such beautiful expressions from my insightful daughter’s mind.
Was I watching a work of art in the making? Like that of an artist dipping her fingers into paint and spreading streaks upon the canvas or a dancer as every twist and turn of his body causes the music to leap off the paper with him?
As Olivia grows in maturity and experiences life, I wonder if her examples will broaden. Maybe I will ask her to elaborate this word, once more, in the future. How drastically will her views change?
Olivia spent the first ten years of her childhood living in a home of Domestic Violence. I thought of how our life had formed her reality of freedom and the way she expressed it. The last five freed from that environment as she, her sister and I stepped into a world we had yet to know together.
One of Freedom. And what a world of vibrate, beautiful color and sound it is!
©2018 Wina Rushing – All rights reserved.
My recently released novel Escaping the Knight in Dirty Blue Jeans, takes you into our life before and after Domestic Violence. Step into Freedom!
The Fullness of Freedom 
“With freedom comes movement” – love that line.
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Thank you, RJ. Truly eye opening.
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