What is the relationship between internal and external freedom

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The feeling of freedom gives enormous vital energy, which motivates a person to certain actions and actions. Thanks to this hidden potential, a person expresses his specific desires and reveals the full depth of his individuality. In the modern world it seems there is everything to feel free. However, many are inclined to believe that a person is still constrained by many frameworks and restrictions. This issue is addressed by the psychology of freedom.

Why do you need to be internally free?

Inner freedom of a person allows:

Consider all your possibilities and realize your abilities, talents, and full potential.
Have an adequate perception of reality in accordance with the current situation, and not be guided by habits, stereotypical thinking and beliefs inspired by someone.
Come to the realization of your true purpose and the ability to boldly walk along the path of life.
Find an activity that will become your favorite thing, set goals and achieve them without unnecessary effort and destructive stress, but while enjoying the process itself.
Have your own opinion, take responsibility for your life, your own decisions and choices.
Build harmonious relationships with people in your close circle, based on mutual respect, understanding of each other and love.
Help your children adapt to the realities of growing up. At the same time, everyone can make mistakes, but the main thing is to understand and correct your mistakes in time.
Get rid of relationships that destroy everything in their path.
Build relationships with those around you with whom you have common interests. Moreover, such communication should be based on openness and sincerity, and bring pleasure, inspire, enrich, and spiritually.
Live according to our scripts, which can be rewritten as we like.
Be capable of creativity, and also be able to truly love, delight and inspire others.

In fact, a person needs to be internally and externally free to become truly happy. Everyone has the right to live as they see fit. Some people live a lazy life, others choose to work hard. Some people prefer creative professions, while others cannot live without mathematical formulas. Each person has his own abilities and capabilities. A free person can allow himself to choose what he likes. But the majority, unfortunately, live with imposed goals, interests, beliefs and worldviews. Inner freedom, a feeling of people with which not everyone gets along. The path to freedom is thorny and the price for it is misunderstanding on the part of others who are accustomed to existing according to generally accepted norms. Sometimes there may be both disapproval and censure for such a choice.

Yes, we can leave the house and come back at any time. And they are also free to choose their social circle, etc. However, this is not enough to feel completely free. And although each of us dreams of finding inner freedom, there are a number of limiting factors.

News

The psychology of freedom is not about what is written in the Constitution and not about how it is implemented. This is about how and why we use or do not use the opportunities for free choice and independent decision-making that life provides us. This is about freedom and unfreedom in human history. This is about the boundaries - this is possible, but this is no longer possible - that are set to us and how we test and push these boundaries. This is about freedom where there seems to be none - in a dictatorship or a camp. It's about the freedom to choose yourself - who and how do I want to be? This is about whether we - each of us and all of us as a whole - are doomed to move along a rut or whether we can choose our own future.

The famous liberal politician Leonid Gozman gave a lecture on the psychology of freedom at the European University at the “Autumn Science Marathon” on 10/04/17. Among the topics he touched on were the disposition to make independent decisions, defining and changing the boundaries of what is permitted, the perception of freedom under a dictatorship, and the possibility of forming a liberal identity in Russia.

Freedom of action cannot be absolute; there are reasonable restrictions. We tolerate metal detectors at airports, pay taxes, and are in no hurry to call a prosecutor when our personal belongings are searched. Freedom is limited by the consequences of actions - you cannot set fire to a house or drive drunk. Moreover, in every country there are enclaves with less or more freedom. An army or a monastery obviously implies less freedom than everyday life. A less obvious thing is freedom as the art of using choice. And making this choice can be very difficult.

One of the main mechanisms of dictatorship is the absence of the need for choice. Free human behavior is formed by two main factors - high intelligence and the need to search for new sensations, sensation seeking. It is important to have some external stimuli. There are people who have a stronger taste for food and are prone to adventurism and adventurousness. Preparation for such a perception of reality is not direct. The image of the world cannot be written down in the constitution; each person forms it independently, and we do not quite understand how this happens. Some people see freedom, others don’t.

The political situation always implies prohibitions. The position of almost absolute freedom in this context is the status of a dictator. Each of the dictators has a rationale for their actions, a desire to get rid of chaos. This requires creating the world and its laws from scratch.

Freedom is defined by setting boundaries. This happens with the help of marking laws. But absolutely everything cannot be spelled out in them. In America, there is a Christian community with very strict regulations - its members do not use electricity, use special strollers instead of cars, and wear special clothes. At the same time, young girls go to the service in sneakers and already at the door change into shoes. The boundaries of even fixed rules are constantly shifting. Twenty years ago you couldn’t speak at a university without a tie, today you can do it in a sweater.

Traffic rules are a good example of political thinking. In America, the speed limit is 55 km/h. you could exceed up to 64 km/h without being stopped. This is not written down in documents; you have to check it from your own experience. In one of his books, Freud cites a myth - a father keeps his children under pain of castration. They begin to rebel and when they realize that their father is weak, they kill him. In fact, his power was an illusion - he weakened long before he was killed. Chamberlain and Daladier could have destroyed Hitler back in 1938, but they overestimated his power and fell under the magic of dictatorship. During the first Congress of People's Deputies, a weaver from Grozny, Sazhi Umalatova, approached Gorbachev. She said that Gorbachev was doing his job poorly and should resign. Previously, people were shot for this. Only 36 years have passed since Stalin's death. Why did Anatoly Lukyanov give her the floor? He was testing the boundaries. Umalatova calmly took her place and came to the congress again the next day.

Boundaries are checked both from above and from below. At the RVIO exhibition in the Manege “Myths of War” my name [Leonid Gozman] was indicated on the information arrows on the floor along with the names of Hitler and Goebbels. After an official appeal, an apology was made to me, and the arrow itself was removed.

Freedom is not always a good thing. After the emancipation of slaves in America, there was a sharp increase in alcoholism and crime. For some of the liberated people, the reform of 1861 turned out to be a tragedy. But strategically, the growth of freedom leads to social growth. Lenin wrote that after Alexander II, Russia developed at an American pace. Under Alexander III and Nicholas II, three times more railways were built than under Stalin.

Now the world is freeing itself from the dictates of predestination. Class has ceased to be a decisive factor. Having physical strength has become less important than it used to be. I know a Harvard Business School professor who was born in a Pakistani village. He said that people still live there in the 9th century. The religion of the parents plays much less importance. My friends from Germany - devout Catholics - refuse to baptize children in infancy and hope that they will make this decision on their own in adulthood. Race is no longer as important as it once was - at his first inauguration, Obama said that previously in America his father would not have been allowed into a restaurant. They also stop paying attention to the issue of gender. When elected, Sarkozy announced that half of his subordinates would be women. Macron no longer makes such statements. Interestingly, the most innovative place on Earth is also the freest: Silicon Valley.

During the Kuhn test, the respondent is asked “Who are you?” twenty times. First, people indicate membership in large groups that are not usually chosen - gender, race, often this also applies to profession. But there is an exception - political choice. Political identity is freedom. I choose who I support.

Some groups have formal subjectivity - the prime minister or president speaks on behalf of the entire nation. But most groups do not have formal subjectivity. Nationalism in our time ceases to use racist explanations, it becomes civil, defined through emotions. Russians tend to love birch trees, Germans love oak. When Alexander Rutskoy began to flirt with the national theme, he stated that he did not drink whiskey and gin, and preferred only vodka from alcohol. In a state of absence of formal subjectivity, people appear who work as a checkpoint - they decide whether you passed or not, whether you are correct or not. Islamists who blow themselves up during terrorist attacks have no doubt about the correctness of their actions. During the controversy, Prokhanov once said that for a Russian person the state is more important than life. He knows exactly what is right for a Russian and what is not. Just as Senator McCarthy understood everything about Americans before him. Such people unusually narrow the space of freedom and act as dictators themselves.

Group differences greatly limit group diversity. The Japanese are short, the Swedes are tall. At the same time, there are Japanese who are taller than the average Swede and Swedes who are shorter than the average Japanese. There are two outstanding directors in Russia - Nikita Mikhalkov and Andrei Smirnov - which of them is more “correct”? Speransky and Pobedonostsev - which of them is the “right” politician? Yegor Ligachev and Alexander Yakovlev are both Russian communists. Who has the right to speak for everyone? Nobody. We determine our own belonging. We can choose ourselves. There is a well-known phrase “we are Russian, and that says a lot.” In fact, nothing is said. because there are two different directors - Smirnov and Mikhalkov.

Part of humanity has the experience of living under a totalitarian dictatorship, in prison, in a clinic, in places where there seems to be no freedom at all. But it still exists. In the 70s, the following experiment was conducted - with the help of electrodes implanted into the brain, its participants experienced powerful stimulation in the center of aggression. At that time, in front of them lay a stack of white paper and a manuscript. Everyone started tearing the paper. One of the participants broke a chair.

In another experiment, people were put into a hypnotic trance, then given a stick and convinced that it was a gun. They were asked to reload their weapons, and after that they were pointed to a person standing in the corner - there was no one there, but the participants were sure that this person really existed. When people were ordered to shoot, they fainted. If you have an internal prohibition against shooting a person, you always have the freedom to implement it. The question is about sanctions - those who do not shoot will most likely be shot themselves. Austrian psychotherapist and concentration camp prisoner Viktor Frankl said that there is always the last freedom - a relationship to what is happening. We can find something similar in Mandelstam: “I will not remain silent, I will not drown out the pain, But I will draw what I am free to draw.” The main condition for this freedom is an understanding of the truth. It can also be taken away; this requires lying. When we see an SS soldier in uniform, everything is immediately clear to us. When we see him in civilian clothes, things become much more complicated. In the first days after the terrorist attack over Sinai, they kept silent about the fact that it was a terrorist attack. Different versions were called - the tail fell off, something else. If you know the truth, you can formulate your position - in this case, militaristic or vice versa. That's why dictators always lie. They don't want people to be able to make up their minds.

The most important question is whether we can choose our future. Sometimes parents and popular culture convince us that nothing will work out, the boundaries of freedom are very limited. Here I want to refer to the experience of psychotherapy that was important to me. A man comes and says that he lives in two rooms, with his wife, dog, goes to work, and he feels very bad. Psychotherapy cannot change the conditions of his life. But it is capable of changing the perception of these conditions so that a person feels inner freedom, stops being ashamed, and looks at things with different eyes. I will do what I did before, but I will be free. For this to happen, you need to deal with your past. Only then can you choose a new life. We are constantly fighting with ourselves, trying to find ourselves, but first we need to realize our weaknesses and limitations. Can we do something similar at the civic nation level? We are constantly pointed to Ivan the Terrible, Joseph Stalin, the whole history of Russia in such an interpretation is one complete darkness. But there are also positive examples - Japan, Germany. Yes, the occupying forces determined the speed of change, but without the efforts of the people themselves, nothing would have happened. Another positive example is the fight against corruption in Georgia, the success of which is recognized by both supporters and opponents of Saakashvili. Or democracy in India - many residents of the country believe that the level of democracy directly correlates with economic development. Look at Goa, for example. Democracy does not come naturally to India, but people understand that its mechanisms need to be adopted. In Russia there are prerequisites for positive changes - European identity, a high level of urbanization and education, great culture. Whether we are in a rut or capable of building our future is not a question of reality, but of the representation of reality, of attitude towards oneself.

One day I had a conversation with a very smart person from “our” political spectrum. He said, look, we always lose. Alexander II started well, his son practically turned everything around. February lost to October, NEP lost. Later I found something to answer him: yes, we always lost, but they never won either. We always came back.

Text author: Alexey Pavperov

Limiting factors

Often the desire to gain freedom is not enough. This requires a tremendous amount of work on yourself. Man has been given a great gift - inner freedom, the level of which is different for everyone. And this gift can be developed. But on the way, in fact, there are many obstacles and obstacles. We are being hindered by:

Moral standards that are invented and imposed by someone.
Features of education. Each person was given certain complexes in childhood. Some people have very little, while others get it in full. Most of the complexes were planted in us by our loved ones, our parents. And often strict parental forbidden words accompany you until the end of your days. For such people, when they become parents, it is important to “inherit” the same prohibitions to their children. At the same time, all boundaries of personal space are violated due to the fear of not being like everyone else. Yes there may be exceptions. Someone still decides to break the rules and resist the recommendations and advice of the older generation. However, this freedom is obtained in conditions of growing tension and complete misunderstanding.
Childhood traumas of a psychological nature prevent one from enjoying complete freedom, emerging and affecting the quality of life in adulthood.
The traditions of a family or clan are often very difficult to break. After all, this could threaten a complete break in the relationship.
Artificially created restrictions on freedom. This has to do with ideological persons.
Comparisons with others, often not to one's advantage, prevent one from living calmly, being happy and free.

Willpower - what is it?

If we had more self-control, would we all eat healthier, exercise regularly, avoid drugs and alcohol, save for retirement, stop procrastinating, and achieve all sorts of lofty goals?

According to all surveys, lack of willpower is the No. 1 reason for not following through with such changes.

Many people believe that they could improve their lives if only they had more of this mysterious thing called willpower.

In 2011, 27% of survey respondents reported that lack of willpower was the biggest barrier to change. However, although many people blame a lack of willpower for their poor decisions, they have not given up hope.

Most respondents believe that willpower is something that can be learned. These respondents are up to something. Recent research shows that willpower can actually be improved by training.

On the other hand, many survey participants reported that having more time for themselves would help them overcome their lack of willpower. However, willpower does not automatically increase when you have extra time.

So how can people resist temptation? In recent years, scientists have made some compelling discoveries about how willpower works. In this article we will review our current understanding of self-control.

Lack of willpower is not the only reason why you may not achieve your goals. American willpower researcher Roy Baumeister, Ph.D., a psychologist at Florida State University, describes three necessary components for achieving goals:

first, he says you need to establish motivation for change and set a clear goal;
secondly, you must control your behavior in relation to this goal;
the third component is willpower.

Whether you want to lose weight, quit smoking, study more, or spend less time on the Internet, willpower is an important step towards achieving this result.

At its core, willpower is the ability to resist short-term temptations in order to achieve long-term goals. And there are good reasons for this.

Psychologists at one of the universities in the United States studied self-control in eighth-graders during the school year. The researchers first assessed students' self-discipline (their term for self-control) by asking teachers, parents, and the students themselves to complete questionnaires.

They found that students who rated self-discipline highly had better grades, better school attendance and higher standardized test scores, and were more likely to participate in a competitive high school program.

Self-discipline was found to be more important than IQ in predicting academic success. Other studies have found similar patterns.

The benefits of willpower seem to extend well beyond your college years. Terry Moffitt, PhD, of Duke University, and colleagues studied self-control in a group of 1,000 people who were followed from birth to age 32 as part of the Longitudinal Health Study in Dunedin, New Zealand.

Moffitt and her colleagues found that people with high self-control in childhood (as reported by teachers, parents, and children themselves) grew into adults with greater physical and mental health, fewer problems related to substance abuse and criminal convictions, and better behavior in the field of savings and financial security.

These patterns persisted even after the researchers controlled for the children's socioeconomic status, family life and general intelligence. Findings like these highlight the importance of willpower in almost every area of life.

Definition of willpower

We have many common names for willpower: determination, drive, determination, self-discipline, self-control. But psychologists characterize willpower, or self-control, in more specific ways.

According to most psychologists, willpower can be defined as:

the ability to delay gratification by resisting short-term temptations in order to achieve long-term goals;
the ability to suppress unwanted thoughts, feelings, or impulses;
the ability to use a “cold” cognitive behavioral system rather than a “hot” emotional one;
conscious, effortful regulation of oneself with a limited resource of the “I”, capable of being depleted.

Delay of gratification

More than 40 years ago, Walter Mischel, Ph.D., a psychologist now at Columbia University, studied self-control in children using a simple but effective test.

His experiments using the “marshmallow test” laid the foundation for the modern study of self-control.

Michel and his colleagues gave a preschooler a plate of marshmallows. The child was then told that the researcher should leave the room for a few minutes, and if the child waited until the researcher returned, he could eat two marshmallows.

If the child cannot wait, he can ring the bell and the researcher will return immediately, but then the child will only be allowed to eat one marshmallow.

In both children and adults, willpower can be seen as the fundamental ability to delay gratification. Preschoolers with good self-control sacrifice the immediate pleasure of one marshmallow in order to indulge in two later.

Former smokers give up the pleasure of cigarettes to maintain good health and avoid an increased risk of lung cancer in the future. Shoppers are resisting being 'broken' at the mall to save for future retirement. And so on.

The marshmallow experiments eventually led Michel and his colleagues to develop a framework that explains our ability to delay gratification. He proposed what he calls the “hot and cold” system to explain why willpower succeeds or fails.

The cold system is cognitive in nature. It's essentially a mental system that includes knowledge about sensations, feelings, actions, and goals—reminding yourself, for example, why you shouldn't eat marshmallows.

While the cold system is reflexive, the hot system is impulsive and emotional. The hot system is responsible for quick, reflexive reactions to certain triggers—like putting a marshmallow in your mouth without thinking about the long-term consequences.

If this structure were to be caricatured, the cold system would be the angel on your shoulder, and the hot system the devil.

When willpower fails, exposure to a “hot” stimulus significantly overwhelms the cold system, leading to impulsive action. Some people seem to be more or less susceptible to hot triggers.

And this sensitivity to emotional reactions can influence their behavior throughout their lives, Michel discovered when he returned to his marshmallow-wielding teenage subjects.

He found that teenagers who waited longer for marshmallows in preschool were more likely to score higher on exams, and their parents were more likely to rate them as having greater ability to plan, cope with stress, respond rationally, and exercise self-control in unpleasant situations. situations and concentrate.

But it turned out that the research on marshmallows did not end there. Recently, B.J. Casey, Ph.D., of Weill Cornell Medical College, along with Michel, Yuichi Shoda, Ph.D., of the University of Washington, and other colleagues tracked 59 subjects, now in their 40s, who participated in marshmallow experiments as children.

The researchers tested the subjects' willpower using a test that demonstrates self-control in adults.

Surprisingly, the differences in the subjects' willpower largely persisted over four decades. In general, children who were less successful at resisting marshmallows years ago performed worse on self-control tasks as adults.

A person's sensitivity to so-called hot stimuli can apparently persist throughout his life.

In addition, Casey and her colleagues examined brain activity in some subjects using functional magnetic resonance imaging. Subjects with low self-control showed brain patterns that differed from those with high self-control.

The researchers found that the prefrontal cortex (the area that controls executive functions such as decision making) was more active in subjects with higher self-control.

And the ventral striatum (an area believed to process desires and rewards) showed increased activity in those who had lower self-control.

Research has yet to fully explain why some people are more sensitive to emotional triggers and temptations, and whether these patterns can be corrected.

Willpower and a healthy lifestyle

Every day you make the decision to resist impulses for a healthier, happier life. Whether you're refusing that second helping of mashed potatoes, dragging yourself to the gym, turning down another round of smoothies, or resisting the urge to skip your Monday morning meeting, your will is almost constantly tested.

Limited willpower is often cited as a major barrier to maintaining a healthy weight, and research supports this idea.

For example, a study by Eli Tsukayama of the University of Pennsylvania and colleagues found that children with better self-control were less likely to become overweight as they entered adolescence, due to their ability to control impulses and delay gratification.

However, as described in the previous section, resisting these impulses can weaken your ability to resist the next temptation.

Todd Heatherton, Ph.D., of Dartmouth College, and Kathleen Vohs demonstrated this in a study in which they offered dieting students ice cream after they watched a sad movie.

Some of the subjects were observed without warning, while others were instructed to suppress their emotional reactions through an effort that required willpower.

The researchers found that of all the dieters, those who suppressed their feelings ate significantly more ice cream than those who were free to react emotionally to the film.

People often blame bad moods on what is called “emotional eating.” But Heatherton and Vohs found that the subjects' emotional state did not affect the amount of ice cream they ate.

In other words, willpower depletion was a more important factor in self-indulgence than mood.

The reasons why someone diets may also play a role. As described in the previous section, Muraven and his colleagues found that your beliefs and attitudes can protect you from the effects of burnout.

In one example of this idea, he asked volunteers to refrain from eating cookies from a plate placed in front of them. He then tested their strength of self-control by having them squeeze a hand-held resistance band as long as they could.

He found that people who chose not to eat cookies for internal reasons (such as enjoying resisting the treats) showed better self-control in the exercise experiment than people who resisted for external reasons (such as wanting to please the experimenter).

It's clear that willpower is an essential component of healthy eating. In an environment where unhealthy (but appetizing) food choices are everywhere, resisting temptation is likely to deplete willpower, breaking the resolve of even highly motivated dieters.

However, overeating is a complex phenomenon, with numerous psychological and neurological causes. As a result, the role of willpower is somewhat controversial when discussing obesity treatments.

Some experts believe that the emphasis on self-control and personal choice stigmatizes people and is unlikely to motivate them to lose weight. Such experts believe that practitioners should avoid emphasizing willpower and focus on minimizing environmental influences on eating behavior.

After all, when it comes to our modern environment, resisting the urge to overeat can be a huge challenge. We are bombarded with advertisements for high-calorie treats.

Fast, cheap, processed food is readily available 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and often costs less than healthier options.

However, both willpower and environment play a role in your food choices. A better understanding of both elements will improve options for individuals and practitioners combating obesity.

Willpower also plays a role in other healthy lifestyle behaviors, including the abuse of tobacco, alcohol, and illicit drugs.

According to Kevin King, Ph.D., of the University of Washington, developing good self-control in childhood can prevent substance abuse problems in adolescents and adults.

King and colleagues examined self-control in adolescents as they progressed from 6th to 11th grade. They found that teens who had more self-control problems in sixth grade, such as shouting out answers in class or acting rashly, were more likely to use alcohol, tobacco and marijuana in high school.

Unsurprisingly, willpower also plays an important role in curbing your drinking. One experiment found that social drinkers who exercised self-control in a laboratory setting went on to drink even more alcohol than subjects who had not previously delved into their “self-control bins.”

Another study found that on days when underage social drinkers found themselves having to exercise more self-control than usual, they were more likely to violate their own drinking limits.

This finding provides even more evidence that exercising willpower in one area can undermine your ability to resist temptation in other, unrelated areas of your life.

Understanding the role of willpower will likely be important for developing effective treatments for drug addiction and for helping people make decisions such as eating healthy, exercising, and quitting illicit substances.