“Human beings are possibilities. This thesis, formulated by Jean-Paul Sartre, is not a metaphysical slogan, but an existential statement that commits the entirety of concrete life. We are not born with an established essence or a predetermined destiny: we become what we do with what we have been given. Existing, in this context, does not simply mean being in the world, but being called upon to shape ourselves in it through decisions that no structure can replace.
The freedom imposed on us is not a benign concession, but an inescapable burden. We are not called upon to repeat inherited models or reproduce the determinations of others. As Sartre points out, we are condemned to be free: not choosing is, in itself, a form of choice. Every gesture, every silence, every decision made or postponed is an affirmation of identity, a manifestation of the subject projecting itself into the future. However, this openness to possibility does not become a transformative impulse without a decisive inner experience: the discovery of one’s own power. Authentic motivation does not arise from fear or imitation, but from wonder at a latent promise. Only those who have glimpsed, even briefly, what they could become, gain access to a genuine desire for self-improvement. The will to realize the best version of oneself does not emerge from external pressure, but from falling in love with a future image that presents itself with the force of a vocation. That image does not refer to an abstract ideal, but to a unique task. Being what one is capable of becomes an ethical imperative. Renouncing that possibility is not only a personal loss: it also deprives the world of a unique singularity. Mediocrity, understood as the abandonment of one’s own potential, is not a natural limit, but an act of existential negligence.
Human existence is not closed in a given form. It is a work in progress, a constant opening. We are not what we are, we are what we become through our actions. In this uninterrupted process, freedom should not be understood as an abstract right, but as active fidelity to the best possibility we see in ourselves. Living authentically requires taking responsibility for that possibility and making it a form of presence in the world. Being, ultimately, consists of daring to become.”
Prabhuji
