This Fourth of July, as you watch the sky light up with red, white and blue, remind yourself of the meaning behind the holiday with these 22 quotes about freedom:

1. Know your worth.

“I am no bird; and no net ensnares me: I am a free human being with an independent will.” – Charlotte Bronte

2. Embrace your humanity.

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“Freedom is not worth having if it does not include the freedom to make mistakes.” – Mahatma Gandhi

3. Embrace the feeling of wonder.

“From every mountainside, let freedom ring.” – Martin Luther King, Jr.

4. Release yourself.

“The only real prison is fear, and the only real freedom is freedom from fear.” – Aung San Suu Kyi

5. Accept responsibility.

“May we think of freedom not as the right to do as we please, but as the opportunity to do what is right.” – Peter Marshall

6. Dream big.

“Dreams are the foundation of America.” – Lupita Nyong’oCLICK TO TWEET

7. Rely on yourself.

“Freedom (n.): To ask nothing. To expect nothing. To depend on nothing.” – Ayn Rand

8. Earn it.

“In the truest sense, freedom cannot be bestowed; it must be achieved.” – Franklin D. Roosevelt

9. Practice consistency.

“We must be free not because we claim freedom, but because we practice it.” – William Faulkner

10. Be bold.

“Freedom lies in being bold.” – Robert Frost

11. Feel pride.

“America is another name for opportunity.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson

12. Face the sun.

“Freedom is the open window through which pours the sunlight of the human spirit and human dignity.” – Herbert Hoover

13. Keep the faith.

“This, then, is the state of the union: free and restless, growing and full of hope. So it was in the beginning. So it shall always be, while God is willing, and we are strong enough to keep the faith.” – Lyndon B. Johnson

14. Believe in yourself.

“I am an American; free born and free bred, where I acknowledge no man as my superior, except for his own worth, or as my inferior, except for his own demerit.” – Theodore Roosevelt

15. Find your freedom.

“Is freedom anything else than the right to live as we wish? Nothing else.” – Epictetus

16. Reach for the stars.

“Freedom means the opportunity to be what we never thought we would be.” – Daniel J. Boorstin

17. Leave it better than you found it.

“For to be free is not merely to cast off one’s chains, but to live in a way that respects and enhances the freedom of others.” – Nelson Mandela

18. Embrace the power of hard work.

“Everything that is really great and inspiring is created by the individual who can labor in freedom.” – Albert Einstein

“The essence of America—that which really unites us—is not ethnicity, or nationality, or religion. It is an idea—and what an idea it is: that you can come from humble circumstances and do great things.” – Condoleezza Rice

20. Achieve greatness.

“I believe in America because we have great dreams, and because we have the opportunity to make those dreams come true.” – Wendell Willkie

21. Find your wholeness.

“Life without liberty is like a body without spirit.” – Kahlil Gibran

22. Be brave.

“Those who won our independence… valued liberty as an end and as a means. They believed liberty to be the secret of happiness and courage to be the secret of liberty.” – Louis D. Brandeis

Editor’s note: This post was originally published in July 2016 and has been updated.
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