Ah, Freedom!

Therefore, cheer up your hearts, and remember that ye are free to act for yourselves--to choose the way of everlasting death or the way of eternal life.  2 Nephi 10:23

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Blue

July 4th in the U.S. (Article below is from a blog post from Voices of Virtue)

Many of us are getting ready to celebrate Independence Day in the United States. Maybe freedom to us is being able to live where we want. eat what we want, choose a career or school we would like to pursue. Perhaps it's freedom to be ourselves. The point is we can all choose! Our agency will make us happy if we use it correctly. Whether it's in matters of morality, standing against sin, or choosing charity for the human family, the choice is ours!!

Every Hour Offered the Opportunity to Make a Decision

Viktor Frankl was a World War II prisoner who lived in a Nazi concentration camp for over 3 years. During that time he could not choose his hair style (his head was shaved), what to wear (he was given work clothes), when to wake up or go to bed (the alarms sounded for waking and bed times), when to stop working (he was made to work past exhaustion everyday and was threatened with being killed if he did not) or even what to read or write (he was not allowed to do either). His choices seemed so limited but he later wrote:

"We who lived in concentration camps can remember the men who walked through the huts comforting others, giving away their last piece of bread...they offer sufficient proof that everything can be taken away from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms--to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way. And there were always choices to make. Every day, every hour offered the opportunity to make a decision." (Man's Search for Meaning, trans. Ilse Lasch, Rev. ed. [New York:Simon and Schuster, 1962] p. 65).

Even if you do not live in the U.S. to celebrate independence and freedom on July 4th, make it your choice to celebrate every day what will always be yours: the freedom to choose.

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  More red, white, and blue found in a vacant lot turned garden in Oswaldtwistle, England