The Courage to Be Worthy

They paid the ultimate price. What are we doing with what they bought?

Recently I was roped into a discussion about "forever wars" and whether they're absolutely necessary to preserve a free society.

And after much debate and soul searching, I've decided- I just don't know.

But I DO feel confident in this:

Freedom exists only because people are willing to die for it.

My dad served in the Navy during wartime. Many of his comrades didn't make it home. They gave up everything so we could be free. So you and I could have the opportunity to do something with our lives.

Are we holding up our end of the deal?

Most of us think of freedom as the right to be comfortable.

• Scrolling TikTok

• Playing it safe to be liked

• Working a 'safe' job you hate

• Doing what you want when you want

• Avoiding hard conversations

• Living small & choosing easy

• Eliminating sacrifice

But that's not freedom. That's prison with better PR.

I've come to believe that real freedom is the ability to create meaning, to build something that matters, serve others through your work and stand for what's right when everyone else is too scared.

But here's the catch - freedom without responsibility is chaos. And chaos is how freedom is lost.

And you can't have a free society made up of people who are afraid or unwilling to be free.

Every decision you make is a vote for the kind of world you want to live in.

• Choose mediocrity, you vote for a mediocre society.

• Choose comfort over growth, you vote for stagnation.

• Avoid taking risks, you vote for a weak, anxious culture.

• Refuse to stand for anything, you vote for the end of morality.

But I don’t believe that the people who died for our freedom sacrificed their lives so we could live without purpose.

They died so we could live and create something meaningful.

The real threat to freedom isn't external armies or foreign powers - it's inside of us.

It's the voice in your head that says "stay quiet." The one that urges you to just 'get along.'

• It's the culture that rewards compliance over courage.

• It's the systems designed to make you dependent instead of capable.

• It's your own willingness to trade autonomy for the illusion of security.

Freedom requires courage - not just the courage to die for something, but the courage to live for something.

To build something. To risk something. To stand for something when it's inconvenient.

What You Actually Owe

I wonder what would happen if we stopped asking what society owes us and instead asked what we could do to leave things better than when we arrived on this earth.

What if we focused on creating more than we consume? Raising kids who understand personal responsibility better than entitlement? Building businesses that actually serve people?

Maybe your personal development isn't just about you. Maybe every time you choose growth over comfort, you're participating in something larger. Maybe it’s your purpose to become great, and to use what you learn along the way to serve others.

Many people sacrificed their lives so you could grow, so you could build, so you could become who you are capable of becoming.

The question isn't whether you *should* honor that sacrifice. The question is whether you are already?

• Are you building something worth defending?

• Are you becoming someone worth respecting?

• Are you serving something greater than your own comfort?

Or are you living the same comfortable life as everyone else in a society that's slowly forgetting what made it worth dying for?

I don't know the answer to that. Only you do.

But I do know this: freedom without responsibility isn't freedom at all - it's just delayed tyranny - and avoiding that future is worth sacrificing for.

I hope this article encourages you on your journey to become the best version of you because the courage to live meaningfully might be the only thing that makes their sacrifice worth it.

If you struggle to do it for you. Do it for them.

Until next time & with love,

Tiffany