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Can you buy freedom?
"The Unbearable Lightness of Being" (Milan Kundera) explores the intertwining lives of four characters against the backdrop of 1968 Prague. The novel examines the weight and consequences of human choices. Tomas, a womanizing surgeon, and Tereza, his idealistic wife, grapple with love and infidelity. Sabina, an artist and Tomas' mistress, seeks personal freedom. The novel juxtaposes their personal struggles with political turmoil. Kundera seems to suggest that life's transience and lack of repetition make individual actions weightless, yet profound.
The concept of eternal return, explored in the novel suggests that our lives are singular and unrepeated, lacking the cyclical patterns seen in eternal recurrence. This uniqueness implies a lightness or lack of inherent significance to our actions, as they are not bound to repeat endlessly. Yet, paradoxically, this very lack of repetition makes each action profound. The idea is that the fleeting nature of experiences and choices adds depth and meaning to each moment, emphasizing the significance of individual actions within the context of our brief and unrepeatable existence.
I turn to this novel often when I feel overwhelmed or underwhelmed by work and life. The subsequent paragraphs will hopefully make it clear.
I have been on this elusive quest to buy freedom for as long as I can remember. It started in school and continued through my degrees and jobs. My underlying assumption was that success and accomplishment would help me break free to do whatever I pleased. And it did to a certain extent. Let’s call this stage Minimum Viable Freedom (MVF).