Crying For Freedom

Thursday, September 30, 2010, 15:09

Freedom is our birthright and yet we crave for it. A short story narrated by Osho conveys this truth.

Once a man, a staunch fighter for freedom was travelling in the mountains. In the course of his travel he halted in a caravanserai to spend the night. In the serai, he found a parrot in a golden cage continuously repeating “Freedom! Freedom" The serai was located in such a place that the word “Freedom" uttered by the parrot echoed all over the valleys.

The man took pity on the parrot and thought, “I have seen many parrots but not one like this did shout for freedom the whole day"

The man hence waited until midnight and tiptoed to the cage and opened its door. He told the parrot, “You are free to go. Nobody is watching. Fly out now and enjoy your freedom in the vast expanse of the sky"

However, much to the surprise of the man, the parrot still clung to the bars of the cage calling out like before, “Freedom, Freedom"

The man hence volunteered to take the bird out of the cage and free it. He hence tried to take the bird in his hands. The bird clung to the bars of the cage more tightly and shouted for freedom. The man whispered in haste, “What's happened? Why are you not flying out? I am only trying to help you"

The bird but started pecking at his hand and hurt him. The man on the other hand was adamant to free it. He hence managed to pull the bird out of the cage and released it into the sky. He felt a deep sense of satisfaction though his hand was hurt.

The next morning when he woke up he heard the bird calling out for freedom. He thought that the bird must be perched upon some tree and calling out for freedom. He was only shocked to find the bird back in its cage, with the door open calling out for freedom like before!

Osho, through this story points out that we humans are no better than the parrot. With freedom being our essential nature, we prattle for it thinking that we are bound. Liberation is our true nature and bondage is non existent in truth. We with our conditioned mind, we believe that we are bound and fail to recognise the truth. All efforts to realise the truth is to wipe away our false belief for freedom is not acquired but inherent.