I get to fly around the country often during the ‘off-season.’ (It’s a funny juxtaposition to my life at camp when I never leave!) When I fly, I always ask for a window seat so I can look at the landscape as we pass high above. One thing that always hits me: the Earth is huge!
When you travel and see things like New York’s Empire State Building, the Golden Gate Bridge, and the Grand Canyon, you realize that we people are pretty small. When see a relatively small slice of land from 30,000 feet up, you feel even smaller.
With that in mind, it’s hard to grasp the idea of changing the world. It’s not even comical. If taken as a challenge, this idea is downright impossible.
And yet….
Ripples on Sly Lake
Human culture is too big to change by yourself. Have there been a few people to have done it? Yes. But the massive changes that came from Buddha, Abraham, and Jesus took centuries.
There have been others more recently like Marie Curie, Einstein, Mother Theresa, and Bill Gates who have done so more quickly. (And, yes, there have been some bad guys who have done the same but I’m not going to speak of them.) Their genius combined with the modern technological age allowed their ripples to effect us all.
But making a big change on your ‘world’ doesn’t have to include the whole world. We spend our time running around in our little worlds. Yes, these are connected to others but our homes, our schools, our camps… these are the little worlds in which we truly live out our days.
Do you think have you the ability to change those worlds? Of course you do. And, whether you realize it or not, you influence those ‘worlds’ every single day.
When we sit at the campfire and watch the swallows dip down and fish rise up, we see their ripples expanding ever outward. You create the same ripples with every kind word, every smile, and every helping hand. You also create ripples for the opposite actions and from inaction.
What kind of ripples are you going leave behind today? What effect are you going to have on the world around you? You get to choose. And that choice matters.
Have a wonderful weekend. See you soon!
