Monday, January 18, 2010

Do you dare to dream?



"I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal." - Excerpt from I Have A Dream Speech - August 28, 1963. Washington, D.C.








We should all have dreams that are as noble as this.  We should be able to dream those idealistic dreams even if the world around us sometimes proves us otherwise.  We should also be able to freely live out those dreams even if others oppose you. 

Forty-six years after Dr. King delivered the speech that almost every American (I hope) knows some of the important lines to, I still want to believe that what he preached will one day be reached in this country.  For all to be treated as equals, not on paper but through actions.  In this great country of ours that is a microcosm of the world, millions have come willingly or unwillingly, but in the end the dream is the same, to be free and to be treated as an equal. 

My own immigrant experience is not very different from others that have come to the United States looking for a better life.  My parents may not have fully understood at the time Dr. King's speech or how it would affect them, but I can assure you that they dreamed the same thing.  My brother and I dream the same dream and hopefully his children and my future children will still dream the same dream. 

If we begin to take the idea of equality for granted, then what was the point?  What was the point of so many risking their livelihoods to protest, what was the point in my parents bringing me to this country?

Like a true idealist, I still dream...

I have a dream that one day I will live in a world in which conformity will not beat out the creation of new ideas...

I have a dream that one day the color of my skin, the accent in my voice and the curls in my hair will not be factors in judging my character...

I have a dream that one day we can all really live in peace and love...

I sound like a hippie :) but... 

Do you dare to dream?  As you ponder this question, I leave you with this final quote from Dr. King.

"Man is man because he is free to operate within the framework of his destiny. He is free to deliberate, to make decisions, and to choose between alternatives. He is distinguished from animals by his freedom to do evil or to do good and to walk the high road of beauty or tread the low road of ugly degeneracy" - Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., The Measures of Man, 1959.


No comments:

Post a Comment