The Halls of Freedom - Prologue

The institutionalization of an idea is not only a necessary act in society but is vital for the preservation of our common ideas of norm. In doing so we are taking something quite intangible, like a value, and giving it a form in the manner of an application of its principles. It is the basis of government and commercial enterprise.

In product innovation the individual draws from his inspiration, creates a design, a model and then completes the final product before its marketed to the public. He may name the product after himself and thereafter watch as the product becomes a household item around the world. When that happens the individual experiences a curiosity in his mind about the nature of his being and identity.

A movie star, a TV personality, an author or a politician experience something similar. In that they enjoy a familiarity with the general public with regards to a particular account. However an engineer stands apart as the inventor of a machine. His claim to familiarity is a relation to a product that produces a service repeatedly and enjoys a duration of utility as if it is a helper to the consumer.

The ways in which the inventor views himself comes to resemble the machine he created and he is likely to view his presence in relation to everyone. In much the same way we experience the common relation to values that is shared by everybody. However if we figure that we didn't cultivate that value in an original experience, we are not likely to enjoy the same profound relation with others much like the inventor.

But in losing that value in the best or the worst of times and thereafter coming to rediscover it, we are the de facto originator of the experience for the inspiration that we brought to its re-discovery. Thereafter our common sense of relation to others is as much an instrument of our identity that bonds us in that relation. In a common experience of inspiration by society we are all originators of such a value.

Freedom is one such value that we lose sometimes under the most irascibly strange conditions. Its as if we sometimes seek self destruction as a change in pace. But in its re-discovery, it re-forms borders, relations, friendships and our perceptions of the world. In applying ourselves to understand the experience we may well re-invent ourselves.