“I am conditioned” is like living in coffin. Living out of choices is like a river , always flowing. Enhance living out of choices by opening new windows and refusing to use existing ones.
You say “you are conditioned”. This word ‘conditioned’ is a misnomer and is morbid. It kind of sounds that we are doomed, that is how we are going to stay. It portrays being stuck. Also, it indicates that the blame of being conditioned lies elsewhere. I am not responsible – my parents, relatives, friends, society, media etc. these have conditioned me. But this is NOT true.
Saying I am conditioned, is almost like living in a coffin. But we are not dead, we can wake up and say I refuse to live out of any conditioning. You have always lived out of your choices, your creativity. Just because you made the same choice again and again does not mean you have to make the same today. Just because you have brushed your teeth this way last 10,950 times, does not mean so have to do the same 10,951st time.
I live out of Choices
I may still brush the same way, not because that is how I have brushed all these years, but because I am right now choosing to do so. When you say I am living out of choices, then choosing differently becomes real easy, rather effortless. When we talk of creativity being our key resource, we are saying that I am living out of choices. When I think of children as creative beings, which they are, I am inviting them to live out of choices.
If we want them to live out of coffins, we can all the time tell them right and wrong – we can give our conditioning to them. Moreover, many novels, movies, websites, videos, politicians, textbooks, teachers, advertisers are all unfortunately doing this. If we want them to live out of their creativity, we can nourish that.
We go foraging, collecting, widening their horizons, expanding understanding – enjoying everyday with an empty cup. We invite them to play and dance, with thoughts, emotions, observations, beliefs philosophies – everything . We do play and dance ourselves. Also we imagine by listening, accepting, letting go, – by taking them seriously and by not taking our views seriously.
Finally we enhance creativity by opening new windows by simply refusing to use the existing ones. We put constraints. And one mighty constrain I can put is that I refuse to live out of any conditioning. Now I live creatively.