#75 - 3 Minute Thursday: Finding Your Freedom

Welcome to our weekly segment, "Three Minute Thursday"  (#3MinThursday) where I highlight a piece of wisdom I’ve come across from my own readings over the past week, or share with you an inspirational anecdote that can help you lead a more calm, free and compassionate life. 

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Earlier this week I got some sad news – a former boss of mine from London passed away. He left behind a beautiful family – a wife and three kids. He was an amazing human with great empathy and compassion for humanity and others.

I'll be the first to admit, that most days, I’m not thinking about life as impermanent, as transitory. Most of the time I’m playing for the future. For the next week, the next year. But this incident gave me that reminder I needed to keep mortality in mind each and every day. To live each day as if it were my masterpiece, not as if it's just another ordinary day in an infinite life.

Stoic philosophers opined on death greatly and have left a litany of profound knowledge we can use to our benefit in modern life:

Roman emperor Marcus Aurelius famously said “It is not death that a man should fear, but rather he should fear never beginning to live.”...“Don’t behave as if you are destined to live forever.”

This same week, an incredible Netflix film called 14 Peaks, helped take this Marcus Aurelius wisdom a step further for me.

In 2019, a Nepali mountain climber who goes by the name of Nims, climbed all of the worlds 8000+ peaks - the death zones - in less than 7 months – a world record. He knew that if he quite while on a mountain he would die. But in being so acutely in the present moment as he climbed those mountains, he found that fear of death became irrelevant. In other words...he was free. 

Freedom comes from living fully in the present – free from fears, from worry, from regret, from anxiety, from planning– and living fully with enthusiasm and in the pursuit of a purpose beyond yourself.

For Nims, his purpose was to gain recognition for all the nameless Sherpas that helped countless western climbers over countless years with no credit.

So these two things – the death of a colleague and 14 Peaks helped nail down a solid definition of freedom for me. That freedom happens when you keep mortality in mind which then forces you to live each and everyday in the present without fear, energized by a higher purpose and infusing these present moments with joy and positivity.

Certainly you don’t have to be climbing Annapurna or K2 to find the kind of freedom Nims has – you can do it in your own way. You just have to internalize this definition of freedom and make the life-changing choices that put you on the path to getting it. 

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For more from Host Pooja Mottl:  www.PoojaMottl.com

Podcast Producer: www.Go-ToProductions.com

Twitter: @PoojaMottl

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LinkedIn: @PoojaMottl

Special Thanks : 

Kris Kosach of the TPR Podcast for lending her VO for our Podcast Intro.

Jessica Panian for her help with our graphic design. 

Sufi Kaur for managing and designing our social graphics.