Camus refuses to let freedom become mere permission—that comfortable lie we tell ourselves when we confuse the absence of chains with actual liberation. True freedom, he suggests, is burdensome precisely because it *obligates* us toward improvement; it's not a gift we receive but a responsibility we must earn through effort. When someone leaves a stifling job or relationship, they don't magically become happier; they simply face the harder work of deciding who they want to become without external constraints to blame. The insight cuts against both the libertine who thinks freedom means doing whatever pleases him and the cynic who says freedom is illusory—for Camus, freedom is real, but only insofar as we use it as a tool for becoming better versions of ourselves.