we are trapped.

bouncing around in this glorious gilded cage.

i know this to be true and yet i argue against it with ongoing intensity because i very much believe the heart of peace is found in a certain notion of freedom...

i tell him, when he is overwhelmed by the need to choose, to choose something, a path, a flavor of icecream, a car, a vice. i tell him that these are his choices, his modes of freedom. i tell him resenting what he gives up is a tantrum worthy of a two year old.

i believe these truths with every fiber of my being. i say that giving up love produces love. i assert that spending time on one activity, making a conscious choice, grows you, enables you to handle more. i know that closing a chapter can just begin your book.

and yet i know there is a lie in there. an unsaid "but" within every "spread your wings and fly".

the trap. the glorious and sad reality that we are not omnipotent. the loss of innocence implicit in the need to choose.

look. every time you go to work you are not at home. every time you fall in love you lose independence. and then you build trust, and you lose that glorious fall. you commit, you give up freedom. you break up, you give up comfort. life is filled with distinct and explicit traps that, and if we are smart we methodically engineer our prisons as much as we can.
we decorate our cage. we make it home

the greatest thing you will ever do for yourself is make your cage beautiful, and to perch it on high. pick it out, decorate it, and glorify in the view from every angle. looking out, looking around. find a gate you know how to open, but feel just as safe closing.