15 July 2011 Volume: 21 Issue: 13 North Korea's ... - Eureka Street

Volume 21 Issue: 1315 July 2011Aung San Suu Kyi’s inner freedomEDITORIALMichael MullinsOver the weekend, Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd had the privilege of spending two hourswith Burma’s pro-democracy hero Aung San Suu Kyi. The rest of us were privileged to havethe opportunity to listen to the first of her BBC Reith Lectures, which was broadcast inAustralia last night on ABC NewsRadio.The series of two lectures, which can be watched or read online, is titled Securing Freedom. Itwas recorded in secret and smuggled out of the country by BBC staff.Aung San Suu Kyi was released on 13 November last year after having spent 15 of the past21 years under house arrest. What is most remarkable is that she does not regard her release asthe moment of her freedom.Freedom for her is something altogether different from being allowed to move out of herhouse. The way she explains it makes her actual release from captivity seem almostinconsequential.She says that whenever she was asked at the end of each stretch of house arrest how it feltto be free, she would answer that it felt no different because her mind had always been free.The freedom that mattered most to her was an inner or spiritual freedom.‘I have spoken out often of the inner freedom that comes out from following a course inharmony with one’s conscience.’She insists that spiritual freedom does not imply passivity and resignation, but instead itreinforces ‘a practical drive for the more fundamental freedoms in the form of human rightsand rule of law’.The first step in the battle towards freedom is to conquer fear, because fear paralysesindividuals and whole societies. It is the real enemy, and once it is overcome the battle is asgood as won. Meditation plays no small role in this particular struggle.Western democracies wage wars in the name of freedom. President George Bush spokeabout the freedom America was securing for Iraq, but did not seem able to go into detail aboutwhat he meant by freedom. He was not the only one. It is therefore not surprising thatfreedom eluded the so-called Coalition of the Willing.Aung San Suu Kyi’s Reith Lectures should be compulsory reading for every commander inchief.©2011 EurekaStreet.com.au 42