Climbing the Cosmic Ladder

Being good and doing the right things should be natural behavior for all of us but it usually isn't. For many people, being a good person and a good citizen is considered to be somehow, unimaginably, an affront to their freedom and personal liberty. But that is not what life is about.

Earth is a planet for you to enjoy and a place for you to learn about life during your "first time at bat" as a willed creature. The world is not a playground just for our amusement and pleasure. That is the smaller picture of who and what we are and why we are here. The big picture of our Earthling sojourn is to overcome our natural beginnings and strive for an eternal life that we must earn.

The way to being a good person and a good citizen who does the right things is like climbing a cosmic ladder to eternity. On this ladder there are four rungs for us to climb on our way to becoming a good person and a good citizen who does the right things.

The First Rung

Being good and doing the right things because you are afraid you will be punished if you don't.

The Second Rung

Being good and doing the right things because you want others to do the same for you.

The Third Rung

Being good and doing the right things because you want to be a good person who does the right things.

The Fourth Rung

Being good and doing the right things because you want what is best for others.

The Hidden Cost of Freedom

The price of freedom is manifold. In order to gain freedom people must sometimes fight for it and die so that others may obtain it. Once obtained, many more will fight and die so that freedom will continue ringing its bell of liberty for everyone.

But freedom carries a hidden price tag once it is obtained. Freedom's hidden cost is one that many people fail to see but a price that must be paid nonetheless. This hidden cost must be satisfied in order to assure real freedom for everyone and not mere servitude to authority in exchange for peace and prosperity.

In order to gain real freedom you must always question authority and you must always be ready to challenge authority when you think that authority it is not in everyone's best interests. Paying freedom's hidden price is not only the duty of every citizen in a free society, it is the hidden mark of a man or a woman who values and seeks freedom for others and who cherishes his or her own.

Put on a Public Face

Whenever we venture outside our homes and enter the public arena we are obligated as citizens to put on a public face. This public face, whether it is a genuine reflection of our inner selves or not, must offer those we encounter outside of our homes the guarantee of respect. Laws cannot make us like or love others but we can be required to respect everyone in all our public encounters with them.

Wearing a public face does not deny us the guarantee of freedom of speech as citizens of a free society. Nor does wearing a public face suggest that we are phony and surreptitious and therefore not genuine in our behavior. It merely suggests that freedom of speech means very little if it denies others the right to feel safe and respected as human beings.

There is always room for your real face when you are alone or with others who freely tolerate the real you. And if it should one day happen that your real face and your public face become the same face, then you have become an enlightened citizen whose crowning glory is simply being yourself.