In her milestone speech, forum member pancake shares the precious value that freedom has for her.
Thanks for posting your milestone, Pancake, and congratulations. Five smoke-free years is indeed precious and wonderful!
“The vision that you glorify in your mind, the ideal that you enthrone in your heart - this you will build your life by, and this you will become.” ~ James Allen ~
Few words in any language can embrace the power of the word FREEDOM. There is not a creature of will sharing our world who does not struggle to attain it, hold it precious and if lost, sacrifice whatever necessary to retrieve it. From afar, FREEDOM can seem elusive, fleeting and yet even so engenders a hope, an aspiration that somehow, someday it WILL be ours.
Then, once we have it clutched within our grasp, the magnitude of our prize can be overwhelming. We then understand what we hold is a priceless treasure so great it demands to be shared, that while fragile, is yet the foundation of our strength and inspiration.
Defining FREEDOM is a welcome challenge as we seek to explore all that is possible within our lifetimes. Unfettered, unshackled within our realm living as we were created and intended to live.
These wings were forged in the fire of every hurdle, every challenge overcome over the last five years on this amazing journey we call the quit. Wings crafted of countless feathers to signify each and every act of kindness, marking every word of compassion, every gentle nudge of encouragement and ray of hope so generously shared that they be remembered always. Wings lifted aloft with more gratitude, for each and every one of you, our forumily team, than can ever be expressed for helping to save my life.
FREE and EMPOWERED to live each day as it was meant to be lived.
The wild beasts of the Serengeti plains understand this concept fully, waking each day at sunrise to pursue every avenue their freedom can offer. Their enthusiasm to explore and flourish in their world only tampered by their desire to survive is a rich combination that has no equal. Possessing a SPIRIT of unmitigated determination to reach their potential is as embedded in their creation as is the nature of their species.
WE, you and I, SHARE that spirit and have brought it to bear here, together, with every fiber of our being, with all that we are, all that we can be to reclaim that freedom lost. And so, one day at a time, arm in arm we have.
“We are each of us angels with only one wing, and we can only fly by embracing one another”. ~ Lucretius ~
I will be forever grateful to each and every one of you for helping me save my life and treasure you always.
~Pancake~
Five years, 7 hours, 13 minutes and 21 seconds. 36526 cigarettes not smoked, saving $12,784.11. Life saved: 18 weeks, 19 hours, 50 minutes.
