Earlier this week, I posed the question — what is independence?
Our US history would answer the question rather quickly (even though the answer is not as perfectly straight-forward as we have tended to believe):
Independence from England
We have our reasons that felt necessary enough to take on all the costs involved to achieve it —independence of religion, independence from taxation, independence of...all kinds of things.
What we think it means now, though, is primarily freedom — freedom is our mantra. And, freedom is only partly related to independence. But, what it means now (mostly) is we can do whatever we want.
Literally....
And, freedom seems to mean something more and more like no one can tell us what to do…ever.
And, that’s where the rub comes in.
That’s not what it meant then and isn’t what it means now. No society can really fully function on that premise.
We are not truly independent…ever. And, whether we know it or not, we really don’t want the full consequence of that. It isn’t really a true (or good) goal, as we are actually very dependent (inter-dependent) on many things…in order to have this description of freedom.
We want our freedom, but the ability to enjoy it requires a few things we also want (or need) — like to feel safe (from disease), protected (from mob-rule), basic services of assistance when we are in trouble, etc.
And, truth be told, freedom is really not as much the ability to do whatever we want as it is the freedom not to.
Freedom, after all, is the option to freely give to others out of our abundance based on what they need, knowing that, in so doing, we may need to be the recipients of the same.
In other words, inter-dependence…or, as some have called it, love.
One of the benevolences of freedom for me, is the ability to enjoy the natural spaces our government has provided our society through our national park systems.
This week, we are again enjoying Glacier National Park:
Perhaps independence can afford us some of the greater benefits of recognizing our inter-dependence, like those who had the vision for our national parks. A vision for the betterment of man through the common good.
This is what I’m celebrating about our country this week.
More pics here….
