Today, I want to discuss something that I have long wanted to write more about: Freedom from my psychological perspective.

   This relates to politics as well, especially the way that I feel conservatives misunderstand freedom, or at best, understand it only from their own selfish perspective.

   I began my thoughts about how to present this topic, with my own observation that from a humanistic psychology perspective, freedom is about being given the opportunity to “self-actualize.” This means becoming the best, most socially useful person that one is capable of becoming. Of course, complete self-actualization is a standard of perfection that probably nobody obtains, or very few people, but that is beside the point. It’s about self-improvement, but not, as I understand it, in selfish ways, but in ways that help others, whether it be people, animals, plants or the environment. According to humanistic psychologists, every person is driven to self-actualize, but that drive is often thwarted or even completely reversed, by conditions in the person’s environment. Perhaps bad decision making plays a role in failure to self-actualize as well, but humanistic psychology minimizes that aspect, because our internal moral compasses are thought to lead us down the correct road if we are allowed to.

   While this is a humanistic psychology take on freedom, I believe that most real psychologists in general – unlike the Dr. Phils of the world, who revels in going on gestapo ICE raids – would endorse this definition of freedom. Contrast that to the conventional conservative assumptions about freedom, that are based on capitalism, militarism and individualism. In their view, freedom is something external and solely behavioral. For psychologists, while influencing our behavior, the essence of freedom is internal. In their view, it correlates with money, and they think that’s the way that the world should be. For psychologists, every human should have the same degree of freedom. In their view, freedom is something that needs to be fought for, against outside enemies. For psychologists, the real battle for freedom is inside of ourselves.

I looked up this topic, just to be sure that my take on how humanistic psychology views freedom is correct, and found that I was exactly correct. Here is an article which discusses this topic, among others, by Willard Marsh ([Humanistic Psychology: Embracing Growth, Freedom, And Self-Discovery – Mental Health](https://www.enotalone.com/…/humanistic-psychology…/)).

   The article also emphasizes the importance of freedom and free will in personal growth, which is a common theme in humanistic psychology. This is not a peripheral topic to humanistic psychology, nor indeed, to psychology in general. Rather, it is central to how we view personality and the human experience. Being given the opportunity to self-direct one’s life is crucial to human development.

   If we contrast this view of freedom with conventional views on “freedom,” which have been subject to the narrative of wealthy conservatives – tragically, like so many topics in our society – we can have a better understanding of what’s wrong with their world view. If money can buy freedom, which they will deny, but in fact, they believe and endorse, some people should have far more freedom that others. This creates massive social inequality that hampers the well-being and personal growth of everyone, billionaires included. Further compounding that problem, is the fact that influential, wealthy conservatives tend to be social Darwinists, who believe that they are inherently entitled to a much larger share of society’s pie than the rest of us, and the political influence and wealth that go along with that. Next, they wrap this entire misconceived “freedom” meme in an American flag, with rockets firing and bombs going off, fighting off enemies galore, whether they be commies, terrorists, or whatever, which completely misses the point that it is about oneself and our own personal journeys of discovery and self-improvement. Again, this detracts from our drive to self-actualize, by focusing on basically contrived or nonexistent threats. This is something that Republicans regularly exploit. Just look at how Trump constantly claims an immigrant crime crisis that does not exist. Of course, they are doing the same thing with “election integrity,” when our electoral system is well-run generally speaking, and to the extent that there is a problem, it is being caused by Republicans trying to rig the system.

   These are the kinds of shenanigans that actually hinder our freedoms, while Republican policies that discriminate against LGBTQ people, women, minorities, or whoever they don’t like, more directly acts as an assault on people’s freedoms. All the while, Republicans hypocritically talk as though they are the party of “freedom,” as they actively attempt to dismantle our democratic institutions and constitutional protections. In order to feel justified in doing these things, they have to believe that many if not most, people are not entitled to the freedoms that they are.

   I have one solution to this whole, counterproductive mess: Throw the Republicans out of government, elect progressives, and educate the people so that we can gain a measure of, appreciation for, and understanding of, true freedom.