GETTING OUT OF YOUR PRIVATE PRISON

I read this on Dr Boyce Watkins blog and found it very thought provoking, so i decided to share.

Refuse to remain imprisoned, Get Out and STAY OUT!

Most of us are just a step away from being incarcerated, or have yet to understand what it truly means to be free.

Some think that exoneration from confinement is defined as being physically released from custody and never being arrested again. While this is certainly an important part of the process, freedom is a multi-layered continuum, and the truth is that many of us are actually in prison ourselves. If an allegedly free man is left in a situation where he has no options, then he isn’t much more liberated than a slave.

A man or woman can be physically free, but not mentally, spiritually or economically free. While a vast prison system threatens our liberty, the world presents a plethora of opportunities for people to keep their minds bound by ignorance perpetuated through , limiting environments,  unwholesome relationships, media, unhealthy cultural influences, or an addiction to anti-intellectualism and financial irresponsibility. So, as we all fight to protect and save brothers and sisters who’ve been kept behind by disproportionate systems of punishment, we must all be unified in understanding that all of us must find a way out of our own private prisons.

The first step toward finding your personal freedom is to accept the idea that struggle is typically the only path to growth. Nearly everything worth having is difficult to obtain, so if you do not embrace the struggle, then you are not truly committed to the progress you claim to seek.  Like a man planning to win an Olympic gold medal while eating chocolate doughnuts every day. Our actions must be consistent with our objectives, and we must realize that obtaining our liberty typically comes at a tremendous price.

A second step is to become committed to independent, courageous and creative thinking. Rather than doing things because everyone else is doing them, we should engage in actions and activities because they help us get what we want out of life. There are millions of people who see nothing wrong with watching television for eight hours a day, running to the club on Friday nights, sleeping with people they barely know and doing all kinds of things while never noticing that their choices are merely reflections of pre-defined influences that they’ve been unconsciously persuaded to emulate. This is not to judge or condemn the choices we make. It is to encourage all of us to take a second to question why we do what we do every day.

Third, there’s nothing wrong with hard work and sacrifice. Infact only those who commit to it become lifes true successes. We must embrace and encourage the idea of hard work and support those who push the limits of their capability.

The bottom line is that all of us are in a prison of our own making (I seek to identify and confront my own prisons every day). There’s always a dream we think we can’t fulfill, a habit we believe we’ll never break, or a choice we’re taught that we have to make. In many cases, we even lack the self-awareness to notice the shape of our prison or how to get out of it. We need to realize that we are prison inmates and release ourselves from our individual prisons.

(This Article has been edited by me. To read the original article visit http://drboycewatkins.youngblackstudents.com/?p=332)

Dr. Boyce Watkins is a professor at Syracuse University and the founder of the Your Black World Coalition.

TyF

Get Out & STAY OUT

2Oth July 2011