What price freedom

As an American, I am getting ready to celebrate Independence Day; our Fourth of July.

A day like this causes me to pause to express my appreciation for the freedom I have as an American, the true love of my country, my wish that all peoples in all places could know the sweet taste of freedom, even to my right to express myself in this blog.

Freedom comes at a very high cost; we all know that.

Losing personal independence also comes at a very high cost; a cost too few could ever bear; a cost too few could ever recoup.

So, as I am blessed to celebrate the independence of my country, I celebrate the personal independence that lives in each of us.  It is a gift to be cherished as our own, a gift to be honored in others.

Independence gives us the right to dream, the right to imagine, to right to hope for and to believe that all things are possible – for they truly are.

Be an independent thinker; allow others to do the same. Wherever you are, your personal independence may be your greatest freedom of all.  Exercise it; strengthen it.