"i was a free man in Paris..."

"I was a free man in Paris,
I was unfettered and alive..."

Whenever I hear Joni Mitchell's  "Free Man in Paris"  I think of a story that was shared with me over a decade ago. It was related to me as a true story, that has led to more than a few healings since I first hear it.

As the story goes, there was a slave who was promoted to the position of valet. He served his confederate, industrialist master faithfully. He was quiet, elegant, and unassuming. When his master would go on business trips, he would travel with him. Because he was a slave, he didn't sleep in the hotels where his master stayed, but remained outside or in quarters provided for servants.

Soon he was traveling the world with his master. On a particularly cold Parisian night, he finished his duties and returned to the entrance of the hotel where his master was staying, expecting to wait till morning for his master's first call. Bundled up at warmly as he could be, he huddled out of the cold in the alleyway next to the hotel.

Soon the doorman wandered over to where he was and asked him what he was doing. He explained that he was a slave and that his master was a guest in the hotel. He went on to say that he would wait there until his master needed him the next day.

The doorman looked at him and said, "Sir, this is Paris. Slavery is illegal here. You are free." The slave, waking up to the reality of his freedom, walked away. He never went back. He accepted his freedom.

You see, slavery was still legal in the United States. But in France, slavery had been abolished in 1794. He was not in a place where laws of slave ownership would be enforced. He was -- quite literally -- a free man in Paris.

How often to we walk around thinking that we are in a "country" that has laws that we are enslaved to, and under the enforceable jurisdiction of? That we live in a body with laws of decay and decline. That we operate in a world where laws of socio-economic privilege and penalty prevail. That we are under the thumb of educational hierarchies and intellectual tyranny?

We stand huddled against the cold wall of a building, thinking we are slaves and that if we were to leave, we would be hunted down, shackled in chains, and imprisoned for life. When in fact, we live, move, and breathe in Him. We are not citizens of a land where "enslavement to the most relentless masters" is enforced, or enforceable.

We are citizens of the kingdom of God. We are free men, women, and children in this safe place where slavery has been abolished. We do not live under the tyranny of laws that say we must subscribe to heredity, caste, class, health-predictions, educational hierarchies, socio-economic predestination.

We are free. We can walk away without looking back. I promise.

Not long ago I was struggling with a physical challenge that seemed to make movement very difficult. I was mentally slammed with all the reasons why this was not only reasonable, but expected -- at my age.

One Saturday, as I started a cleaning project, I put a favorite Joni playlist on my iPod - and yes, I still have one of my daughters' old discarded iPods. The first song that came up was "Free Man in Paris." I immediately thought of the story shared above. At the same moment, I bent down to clean under a table, and felt an all too familiar pain.

But this time I didn't just keep moving through it. Or huddle in the cold light of acceptance next to it. I decided to walk away from it. I was not mortal. I did not live in a "country" where the laws of birth, maturity, decay, death were enforced. I was not trapped in a body that was defined by those laws - or enslaved to them. I was a free woman in the kingdom of God.

Every step, every bend, every swipe of the dust cloth was a step away from the feeling that I was waiting for a false master to tell me where I could go what I could feel, and how I could experience my life.

In Science and Health with Key to the Scriptures, Mary Baker Eddy assures us:

"The enslavement of man is not legitimate.

It will cease when man enters into his heritage of freedom, his God-given dominion over the material senses. Mortals will some day assert their freedom in the name of Almighty God."

We answer to one Sovereign, one Law-giver, who is Love. This Love is omnipotent. There is no opposition to His supreme statutes of freedom and liberty. This is where we live. This is the country of our citizenship.

offered with Love,

Kate

 

"Freedom's just another word..."

"Freedom's
just another word for
nothing left to lose..."

Yesterday was Independence Day in the United States.  And Janis Joplin's lyric (above) from "Me and Bobby McGee," kept suggesting itself for consideration.  Not the whole song, mind you, but just that one verse.   But it's a lyric that seems to surface regularly. 

I was never a big Janis-Joplin-screaming-in-the-microphone fan.  So, I rarely listened to her recordings...by choice (although I enjoyed the above-linked rare unplugged studio recording).  But if you grew up in the 1960s, and listened to the radio, this was one song that you couldn't miss, and this particular lyric has always poked at me.

For some reason, it always seemed to upset the apple cart in my Type-A, "high achiever" world.  I'd always associated freedom with gain...not loss.  If I was successful, I would have more, and having more, I would be able to do things that would feel like freedom.  I would be able to live where I wanted, donate to causes I believed in, buy a home that could never be sold out from under us, provide for my family, travel at will, make decisions without worrying about "how much," and, most importantly, I would have the freedom to do work that I loved, rather than work I had to do, just to make ends meet. 

Freedom, I believed, came with more.  Slavery, oppression, fewer choices...came with less. 

I lived within this paradigm for many years....too many years.  But at the deepest level, it wasn't working for me.  Freedom didn't come with more.  In fact, the only thing that seemed to come with having more, were more decisions, responsibilities, and stuff.  

The more that I got what I thought I wanted, the less satisfying it was, and the harder I had to work to maintain it all.   The more often I got what I wanted, the more I wondered if I hadn't just "made it happen" and then I wasn't sure if it was really what was really right for me.  The minute I accomplished my "getting," I would begin to doubt whether it was a gift from God, or just me working really hard.

And this didn't just relate to things...jobs, houses, cars, etc....it was also a side-effect of striving to elicit more admiration from others, achieving more of what was expected of me, having more to say, more control, more to weigh in on...more, more, more.

It was like walking along a beach filled with beautiful shells and not being able to pass even one by without wanting to add it to my collection.  I was out of control. 

That was until I lost it all.   And not only did I lose all the stuff, but I lost the thing that had given me a false sense of worth...the hard won admiration of others.  Most importantly though, I lost that sense of myself, which kept track of personal goals and chronological milestones., other peoples opinions of me and my ability to make things happen. 

And in doing so I gained real freedom.

I learned that "more" was a very fickle "friend."  One moment I was flying high on the wings of accomplishment, and the next I was scrambling across a scree field of mistakes. 

I thought that freedom was something I had to defend, fight for, hold on to...or I would be lost, vulnerable to oppression, and in jeopardy of becoming possessed. But, in that space of losing it all...I discovered that there were things I could never lose or be dispossessed of....and this discovery was my first taste of true liberty. The kind of freedom that Mary Baker Eddy refers to as a "divine right"...and one that we need to only "accept." 

While wandering aimlessly through a particularly low, and despairing, chapter of personal emptiness, I found that this very space of void..."the desert of my human hopes"...was actually a diamond mine, overflowing with those precious things of real value, that I could never lose...honesty, the joy of being at peace with my own thoughts, meekness, my love for others, an appreciation of beauty, hope, faith, humility, patience...and, I was still able to do the work that I loved, right there...right in the middle of that seeming void.  It was revolutionary...for me. 

And it was here that I discovered true freedom.  The freedom to think my own thoughts, the freedom to love without reason, the freedom to show up each moment anticipating a divine surprise...whatever it might be. 

Janis goes on to sing:

"It ain't nothin' honey
if it ain't free..."

I am learning that she's right.  All the stuff we can gather around us, accumulate, purchase, desire, make happen...can be lovely, entertaining, comforting, etc.  But they aren't where we find freedom.  Freedom comes  with a recognition of the unshakable presence of those things that are free...those things you don't have to bargain for, earn, negotiate, maintain, improve, fear to loss of...they come fully developed, perfect, and without condition.  They are yours and you can take them wherever you go. 

This is the kind of freedom I am celebrating today....

In a poem titled, "Woman's Rights" Mary Baker Eddy outlines the constitutional rights that lead to true freedom:

"...The right to worship deep and pure,
To bless the orphan, feed the poor;
Last at the cross to mourn her Lord,
First at the tomb to hear his word:

To fold an angel's wings below;
And hover o'er the couch of woe;
To nurse the Bethlehem babe so sweet,
The right to sit at Jesus' feet;

To form the bud for bursting bloom,
The hoary head with joy to crown;
In short, the right to work and pray,
"To point to heaven and lead the way."

This was her list of rights, that no one could take away...what are yours?

with Love,

Kate

"Everybody has a right..."

"The price you pay for freedom,
might just be your liberty.
Everybody has the right
to be free...."

In this video, Bob Lucas', "Everybody Has a Right," is beautifully rendered by my "sister," Lisa.  Her voice pleads for individual and collective surrender.  It implores us to release our hold on the hearts, and lives, of others.  It speaks to what is inherently generous in us...and it is timeless.  It speaks to that which loves to watch butterflies, hummingbirds, a leaf carried on the river's song, geese in migratory flight .

It would have been hard for me to watch it, tonight, and not make the connection between it's message of liberty, and that of countless other freedom songs I've long loved.   From "Swing Low, Sweet Chariot," to "We Shall Overcome," men and women of every race and color have employed music to share their cry for emancipation.

I remember standing on the steps of my high school in the late sixties and singing:

"Mine eyes have seen the glory
of the coming of the Lord...

In the beauty of the lilies
Christ was born across the sea,
With a glory in His bosom
that transfigures you and me:
As He died to make men holy,
let us die to make men free,
While God is marching on.

Glory, glory, hallelujah!
Glory, glory, hallelujah!
Glory, glory, hallelujah!
While God is marching on."

We were just kids poised on the brink of a future, we were absolutely certain was filled...to the brim...with humanity's collective hopes for religious, racial, and gender freedoms.  Civil rights, women's rights, the right to worship, the right to vote...all these things were calling us forward.

Martin Luther King and the Kennedy brothers were our heroes.  And we really did think that we were on the verge of something so revolutionary, that the world would never be the same.  We had a dream...we still do.

Lisa's rendition of "Everyone has a Right," reminds me of that gray January day. We were a rag tag group of long-haired teenage revolutionaries...in mini skirts, jeans, and fringed buckskin vests...singing the only freedom song we knew well enough to sing without hesitation .- we'd all memorized it in grade school.  We sang because singing united us in protest of all that seemed so unjust...a war, segregation, gender inequality in education, sports, business, finance, family.

Our plea was simple.  Please let us go.  Please release your hold on our lives' promise.  Please let us, and our brothers and sisters of color, have the freedom to...well, just be.  To be all that our hearts have desired, our minds have dreamed, and our hopes have propelled us towards.

Another "sister," Heather, reminded me...today...that Martin Luther King, Jr. once wrote:

"I refuse to accept the view, that mankind is so tragically bound to the starless midnight of racism and war, that the bright daybreak of peace and brotherhood can never become a reality.

I believe that unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word."

I do too.  I believe, with all my heart, that "unarmed truth and unconditional love will have the final word," and we will all be free.  When we love someone...or many someones...we are selfless enough to yield our hold on their hearts, their lives, their dreams.   We rejoice in their liberty, we celebrate their independence, we delight in watching them pursue their God's inspired hopes.  We sing...

Still singing...
Kate
Kate Robertson, CS

[photo credit: Nathaniel Wilder 2010]