Too much choice.

I am easily distracted. I have two credit cards with thousands of pounds of available credit. I also have a large overdraft and thirty days off a year to go mad.

When you work in a mind numbing job, sometimes going mad really appeals. It is as if by losing yourself, you can also lose the pain of the unfulfilled dreams, the girlfriends that might have been and the hampered ambitions of youth.

Not to sound melodramatic - but the prisoner lives with certain advantages. He knows how long he has to serve. Once he accepts that, he can begin to develop and enrich his life. He might study for a degree, write a novel or learn to speak a second language.

In a 'free' society - it is all too easy to get distracted. In order to overcome the distractions of drink, numerous holidays and impulse buying, you need to also think about how easy it is to dig yourself into a financial hole.

It is not the grim reaper who is to be feared but a well polished salesman with the broadest of smiles, telling why you simply need the BM and detached house, in order to feel equal to your peers.

There is too much choice and far too little self control.

Freedom

In the west, the concept of freedom is held up as an ultimate ideal. Moreover, as a population, we generally understand ourselves to be free. What duplicity!

Most of us are wage slaves. We work in jobs that are tedious, tiring and soul destroying. Such jobs take up most of our energies. This in part explains our love affair with the concept of freedom.

Freedom is a negative value. It deals with lack of constraint, lack of domination etc.

Of course, there are different types of freedom. We may have 'freedom of expression', 'economic freedom' or 'physical freedom'. When each kind of freedom plays out, there can be consequences that seem contrary to the very notion of freedom.

For instance, the freedom one acquires through great wealth can have untold consequences that is not always apparent. It is a fallacy to maintain that anyone can be rich because everyone can not be. If everyone was rich, this would mean that there would no service industry to speak off. Only volunteers would work in care homes, drain sewage systems and generally do the dirty jobs.

The idea of freedom of expression is normally contained with a specified sphere. Equal opportunity laws, while in general a good thing, curtail political expression within the work place. It is a nonsense to say that in the west we enjoy such a freedom, without noticing that political space is already well defined.

While we are said to have physical freedom, this too needs further consideration. It is true that with a passport, we can enjoy international travel etc. In most cases, however, due to economic necessity, most of our weeks are spent in jobs. Our ability to travel and explore the globe is constrained heavily by economic considerations.

As a negative value, freedom does not normally prescribe what one should do. We hanker after what we think we have already obtained.