In reading Rethinking Freedom, I identified most with Murdoch’s vision and version of a real and tangible freedom. A freedom that involves a sense of realization and adaptation towards a reality relative to one’s own experience, value judgment, ethical point of view, and lifestyle. I believe that that this relative freedom can only be accomplished through how one acts upon or reacts towards the people around them and the environment that surrounds them. To Murdoch, “being wide-awake and seeing clearly are not the same…Seeing clearly means not so much seeing through or seeing past the reality of everyday life but seeing all the spaces and places within everyday life where alternative ways of living and being… are possible” (98)
Being in the classroom has helped me open my eyes to a much more important perspective, towards the very impressionable point of view of the students in the classroom. It is a very diverse point of view of whom will have very diverse homes that support and shape each individual perspective. And recognizing my identity as their teacher-figure has helped me see clearly, realizing that having that identity opens up doors towards achieving a more real and tangible freedom especially within the classroom.
Even in costume, I feel free being able to walk around the tables and help students that need help. In doing so, they react positively; they interact, and learn – creating reaction to my actions. This example of freedom is tangible, it’s quantitative, and it’s real. I believe “Freedom has little to do with choosing between one value and another; instead, freedom is the freedom to act in accordance with the values one already possesses” (90). In teaching these younger students, I’ve noticed that lessons are most effective when [the students] can apply them simply themselves towards experiences within their own lives. The students are free to integrate real life experience in their own imaginative ways: another Murdoch moment.
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