Allegiance is admirable. We pledge it to our country and we cherish it in friendships and family. But blind allegiance to one political party at all costs should give us pause for thought – now more than ever in Connecticut.

There is a real battle for the soul of this great state. Extremes on either side – left and right – threaten to pull us further from the solutions we need to reset and rebuild our economy. The solutions lie somewhere in the middle. They always have.

Common sense and compassion make up the DNA of Connecticut – fiscally prudent New Englanders whose respect for individual rights and intolerance of injustice has made this state a shining example of the best part of humanity. Those are our true core values, not one party’s ideology over the other.

For 10 years, the process of adopting a state budget has been consumed by partisan bickering, budget gridlock and an annual blame game concluded by a frenzied 11th-hour agreement between both parties that yet again delays hard decisions for another year.

For 10 years, state government has had no strategic plan for job growth beyond the next election — and that is why Connecticut’s economy has produced no net new jobs in the last 30 years.

Employers across Connecticut notice and it saps their confidence that Connecticut is the right place to grow or invest or, increasingly, to even stay. All because government leaders choose to focus on their own re-elections – instead of addressing the education and transportation systems that are fundamental to a robust economy.

We have promised our teachers and state employees that we will take care of them in retirement, but we are failing. The debt is there, but the means to pay it is not.

The promises to improve our infrastructure and transportation disappear when governors and legislatures consistently sweep the funds that were supposed to pay for those improvements.

The Connecticut Constitution guarantees a quality public school education for every student. Instead, promised levels of municipal aid have been regularly slashed and the resulting burden falls on local property owners.

That same old rhetoric is out there today as Democratic and Republican candidates offer more of the same old failed promises: giveaways they know we cannot afford and tax cuts they know will put us further into debt.

Compromise in the hyper-partisan Generally Assembly is construed as losing — because one side didn’t win. But compromise for the common good should be the goal of good public policy.

There is a way to stop this win-at-all-costs mentality and the gridlock inherent in the status quo. Each election year Connecticut voters face a choice between staying the course or changing direction. Never has it been more critical to consider an entirely new path, an independent path free of the restraints placed on us by the two major political parties.

Only an independent governor – not constrained by party ideology – could make certain that the promises we make to our families, employers and towns are more than lip service that lasts just long enough to get re-elected. And an independent governor, beholden to no political party, would steer our state back to the middle.

Most voters in Connecticut do not consider themselves on the hard left or right.

The largest block of Connecticut voters is registered as unaffiliated. These voters are neither Democrats nor Republicans. They just want their government to work for them – something it has been failing to do.

Only an independent – supported by the electorate – would carry the mandate to make the structural changes needed to drive employment growth. Only an independent would frame the issues in a way that could bring the two sides together to find real solutions to our educational, transportation and budgetary challenges.

In November, voters will have an opportunity to send an unmistakable message to the two political parties who have controlled everything for far too long: We want change. We want independent leadership to ensure that we all work together as a team, to set priorities and to agree on how we can meet our challenges while honoring our core values of common sense and compassion.

The soul of Connecticut — our Connecticut — depends on it.

Oz Griebel, who lives in Hartford, is an independent candidate for governor and until last December, he was CEO of the MetroHartford Alliance. Griebel was formerly registered as a Republican.