good evening
so tonight I'm talking about life's most
persistent question an urgent question
what are we doing for others and when I
talk tonight I wanted everyone to ask
everybody to reflect about what do we do
for others and what I mean by that is
what do we do for people in our family
outside of our family what are we doing
for people in the community and how are
we thinking about the greater community
in the greater world in terms of how we
help people and what we do for people
and so something about me this is this
is a passionate topic for me when I
first went off to college my all my
degrees are in the helping profession in
Social Work and psychology and really
thinking about how do you help people in
different ways whether it's education
whether it's social service or whatever
it might be so the idea is that the
world is abundant and what I mean by
abundance is that there are so many of
us in this world that do not have to
worry about the basic skills for
survival it's basic things that we need
we don't have to worry about fresh water
on a daily basis think about your own
lives we don't have to worry about food
whether it be food for dinner tonight
breakfast tomorrow the next days we're
not necessarily worried so much about
health care because we have access to
health care and we're also not so
concerned about education because we not
only have access access to education but
we have a choice in education so that's
what I mean by abundance when I talk
about abundance and if we think about
ourselves and we think about our
communities that we're a part of we're
really fortunate to be part of the
abundance communities so there's this
notion of abundance and scarcity so
that's the abundance now scarcity is a
whole other population that really
spends every day concerned about will I
have water to drink the United Nations
is trying to say by the year 2030 they
will have be able to provide fresh water
for everyone and what they've said
recently is they don't even think
they're gonna be able to meet that goal
so the population of scarcity they're
worrying about fresh water they worry
about if they have food not just food
for today or tomorrow but will they have
food next week will they have food - not
even healthy food but just will they
have food health care is non-existent so
they
that's a survival that they're worrying
about and then the other thing is
education if it's safe to go to school
if school is available and forget the
choice because that's not even possible
so we have these two worlds we have
scarcity and abundance and so that's
what I'm asking you to reflect about
tonight when we think about this because
what we want to think about is what can
communities do so what I really want to
talk to be out is when you're reflecting
about what do you do for others how can
we help others is how do communities
come together and make strategic and
significant ways to help others because
sure we all help people in different
ways and we donate and we do different
things but when communities come
together and they band together and they
say we're really going to do something
significant to help people in the world
that's what we can have true change so
there's lots of different ways to do
this there's easy ways hard ways the
right ways wrong ways I always think
there's no wrong way but some of the
easy ways are to say well I donated $50
to that or my son or daughter they
they're a part of this once a year and
so that's really great those are all
good things I'm not minimizing that at
all
but what I am suggesting is a harder way
is for a community to come together and
say from our youngest members of our
community to our oldest how do what do
we want to do that significant what do
we recognize around us whether it's our
local communities the country that we
live in or the world around us what are
some of the problems and challenges that
we recognize we don't have to face
because we're fortunate enough to be in
the world of abundance and when
communities can come together and come
come up with strategic ways to help
others that's when you can have
significant change so what I'm
challenging people to think about is how
do we do that how do we tell our
community we need to have we need to
come together that means our youngest
members our pre adolescents or
adolescents are our parents our
grandparents everyone come together for
a conversation about what does it mean
to truly help others and helping others
to make sure that they have the
sustainability to keep that what they
need whether it be health care water
food or education and if everybody comes
together
then there's impact and their impact
that we're looking for is a large and
so imagine if the community even our
community comes together and we say
we're gonna focus on one thing we've
identified one thing in our local
community or our country that we live in
and we're gonna do one thing all
together because if we do together then
we have a really a big impact and we're
also teaching our youngest tour oldest
members of our community what a serious
impact it is because we have an
advantage we're in the world of we live
in the world of abundance everybody
that's in this presentation tonight
we're in the world of abundance we have
the ability to do that and that's the
advantage if we all work together then
we're really able to have a strong plan
and help people and help people in a
significant way so imagine if we start
talking with our youngest members of our
community you start talking with the
youngest members in your family and we
talk with together in the larger
communities and it doesn't just have to
be a school community it can be a church
community a family community any
community that you belong to but imagine
if we have these conversations and we
start them very young and then we're
really talking about how do we make
significant change in the world because
then we could really lead a generation
and if we lead a generation to
understand abundance and scarcity and
how fortunate so many of us are how we
can really help the scarcity helping
others it's very important and it is
more than just showing up once a year or
twice a year it is about really thinking
long term because we want to talk about
social responsibility and the social
responsibility that we have towards
others and not just looking the other
way but really thinking what do we do
and making a commitment to do that so
imagine if we start to do this as
communities and we start to think about
what are we doing for others and how can
we make this so much bigger and have
greater impact and pick one thing one
thing that's important to us one thing
that's important to the entire community
and then really work on that to have
significant significant impact where we
can open the doors because imagine if we
open the doors and somebody has food the
impact of having fresh food every day
can have on the brain development of
children who are going to school or the
impact of
picking a school and saying we're gonna
help a school have the neat have their
needs met the impact that could be for
students that have an education now an
opportunity for education because we not
only have education but we have the
opportunity to choose a private
education so imagine if we open those
doors what we can do the impact would be
massive so I challenge everyone to think
about what can we do what are we doing
for others to reflect upon that for
ourselves and then let's take action
let's come together as a community let's
come together as communities and really
think how do we help people and how do
we do it significantly strategically and
sustainable because we want it to be
sustainable for the long term so that's
what I'm asking you to reflect upon
tonight
thank you
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