Just like dozens of other things in life, we take our ability to see for granted. While many among us are actually blind and physically incapable of seeing…there are many more of us who have our sight, yet fail to see.
We tell ourselves that our lives are so hectic that we don’t have time to get involved in someone else’s issues and problems, so we purposely narrow our field of vision. Over time, we become jaded in our thinking and allow ourselves to believe that another’s misfortune rests solely on the shoulders of that individual; so we turn away. We find a whole host of reasons to rationalize to ourselves our lack of involvement until one day we are able to see right through someone as if they do not exist.
One of my friends on Face Book posted a link to a social experiment filmed on the streets of New York. Cameras were rolling as a young boy around 10-years old, posing as a homeless child, begged on a city street. He was clad in just a torn short-sleeve t-shirt in below freezing temperatures as others, bundled up to protect themselves from the cold, passed by. At one point, the boy shivering from the elements, climbs into a plastic trash bag and lies down on the sidewalk.
He continued to be ignored for over two hours as hundreds walked by until a homeless man came upon the plight of the boy. Yes, the person with the least amount of resources to help; knelt on the ground and cradled the little boy in his arms and told him everything was going to be alright. The homeless man then took off his own coat, and draped it over the little boy’s shoulders as he asked the boy where his parents were.
For me, the most heartbreaking aspect of the video was when the homeless man told the little boy that he was homeless too, so he understood how the little boy felt. His stature in life had not risen so high that he couldn’t lower himself to have empathy for another.
The video ended with these two quotes printed on the screen. Neither was attributed to their authors, but the one from Mother Teresa I readily recognized, since it is a favorite of mine…
“It's not how much we give but how much love we put into giving.”Mother Teresa
The other one I also love a great deal, and was new to me, so I looked it up on the Internet to make sure its owner was recognized.
"If you wait until you can do everything for everybody, instead of something for somebody, you’ll end up not doing anything for anybody’ – Malcolm Bane.
Below is the link so you can watch the video for yourselves…
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