Seven American Core Values I'm Committed to

Seven American Core Values I'm Committed to

I’m writing down these core values for the charted course that I choose to commit to when it comes to my American values. I don’t think they should be for me personally.

I think all Americans will agree that these are the values the United States was built on. No matter what your policies are, these are seven core values that our country has thrived on, and I invite you to commit to them moving forward. They are not policies or tactics. They are character traits and internal cares embedded deep in us for the sake of the common good of all people.

1. Freedom
This value goes without saying and is a core value of our country. The freedom to think, say, and live how we desire without causing harm to others is important, and it must never be exchanged for anything else. Freedom consists of our personal independence to live and raise our families in the way that we see fit, while respecting the boundaries and good of our neighbors. Freedom doesn’t seek harm on others, nor do our personal freedoms restrict others’ freedoms.

2. Justice
Justice is about having the wrongs and the guilty judged rightly, with consequences for broken laws that matter on all political sides. We cannot turn a blind eye to fighting for the good. No matter what the season or the situation is, we must always be willing to seek justice for those who need it and hold others accountable for the wrongs they’ve done.

3. Respect
We must practice brotherly love for all Americans, for each other, even those with whom we may disagree, seeing them as made in the image of God and having collaborative conversations in the spirit of our country’s values and mission. We cannot stand together and fight against the enemies in the world that threaten our country’s freedom and values if we do not start with respect for one another. This means all parties and all levels of government coming together as fellow brothers and sisters, not just within the structures of leadership, but most importantly for the everyday citizens who elect our officials to government.

4. Truth
Truth is about accepting the raw facts and data of how things are, without personal bias that would distort reality. We must strive for complete honesty with one another. We must determine our courses of action and structure our policies around the truth of what is actually happening. We will only earn the trust of one another, both in political leadership and in citizenship, by putting the truth first. The truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth.

5. Personal Accountability
Personal accountability is the practice of taking the log out of our own eyes and accepting responsibility for our own actions. We must refuse to deflect or gaslight each other when we ourselves are held accountable to the truth, to justice, and to upholding our country’s core values. We must learn to recognize our mistakes and our poor decisions, refuse to make excuses for them, and stop deflecting attention from our mistakes by focusing on those we disagree with.

6. Courage
Courage is the boldness to live out our values, to stand for them, and to fight for them, even if it means sacrificing popularity, reputation, and sometimes even our own lives. For some of us, it means avoiding people-pleasing decisions and avoiding trying to make everyone happy, which is impossible. It means stepping out of our comfort zones, refusing to stand on the sidelines, and being willing to take a stand when it’s most inconvenient.

7. Opportunity
Opportunity is about both our government’s leadership and our local citizens working together to ensure that everyone has the opportunity to thrive and succeed in their community. Where people have less opportunity to pursue a life of happiness and success for their families, we, as the collective, must work together to ensure no barriers exist for that individual. This is what makes our country stand out. We are a land of opportunity where anyone in any situation should have the freedom to pursue endeavors that will benefit them and one another.

These are the seven core values of our country that I have written down for myself to follow, based on our country’s rich history and accomplishments. They’re the core values that invite others from all political parties to come back to.

I realize that everybody has different ideas and approaches to how these values play out in everyday life. I recognize that there are going to be different scenarios and different seasons where these values may be considered to play out in different ways for different people. I know that different groups of us will find different approaches to living these out, and that we will not agree on the strategies, policies, and viewpoints that we all bring to the table. And that’s okay. That’s what makes our country great. We should be able to come together with different ideas and policies, but as one united group, focused on the best interests of our citizens.

We should be able to have conversations with each other from different backgrounds and viewpoints and apply respect for one another, not demeaning or demoralizing each other because we see things differently.

We should be able to live in the freedom of knowing that we are not codependent on another person’s view of us to determine how we get to live these values out. Freedom is about being independent from one another’s views and opinions, while also finding attachment and bonding in healthy ways, and collaborating with each other to improve the quality of our great country.

So these are the seven core values that I am committing to living out moving forward, and I invite you to live them out with me. Consider them, and think of the ways in your daily life you can live them out, and invite your neighbors and your community to live them out as well.