Chains forged in life

In the book A Christmas Carol by Charles Dickens, Scrooge is haunted by ghosts (Is that sentence redundant?).  The first ghost is Jacob Marley.  Marley had been Scrooge's business partner.  When he appears in the book as a ghost, he is dragging chains made of "cash-boxes, keys, padlocks, ledgers, deeds and heavy purses wrought in steel."  His chain is made of all the tools of his profession.  Marley says, "I wear the chain I forged in life...I made it link by link and yard by yard; I girded it on of my own free will, and of my own free will I wore it."

What an vivid picture.  I heard that quote on the radio while we were traveling one day.  It made me wonder what chains we forge for ourselves in life, through our own free will.  In what ways to we imprison ourselves?  If you had to describe the chain you wear, what would it be made of?

Once again I hear the phrase I love from the United Methodist Communion ritual -- "free us for joyful obedience."

May it be so.