Pay it Forward When I was in college, I attended a youth conference in Mombasa. It was my first conference to attend and you can imagine how excited I was. It was also my first trip on the train. We traveled from Nairobi to Mombasa overnight, and I could hardly sleep. I was seated next to a beautiful girl and my excitement would hardly make me maintain a conversation with her. Two years ago, about one and a half decades since that first train trip, I found my self seated on the train headed for the same destination. This time it was daytime, and the journey that took us about 14 hours, fifteen years ago, just took us four and a half hours. Call it technology. This time, I was graced with the presence of my family. The excitement was still there. The conference in this coastal town was superb. I got to meet new people. I hardly think I made any new friends. I can't think of any right now. But I came up with two great philosophies that have been guiding me throughout my life. I encountered the first one in an unusual place. In the conference room, there were all sorts of posters hanged on the wall. Some were strategy flows and others were management charts. Having been a management student, I could slightly understand most of them. Sometimes, I become a loner. Yeah, especially when I am with strangers. And at that time, in my lonely rendezvous, I took time to move from one hanging onto the other trying to comprehend them all. Just like an art enthusiast would on the paintings on the gallery walls. Then, just stuck at a corner, it read: "20 years from now, you will regret more of the things that you did not do than things that you did and failed!" I was struck! I imagined that the author wrote it from experience and must had a thorough recap of his past and realized all the opportunities that he had lost and could have made him better than he was then. He must have also realized that life is irreversible and that there are things that he could not be able to do, and he could have only done them then. I can't basically remember whatever else was on that wall. But I still freshly remember that small scrap paper that held that invaluable quote. That evening, after dinner, we went for entertainment. We were watching a movie. As I sat down, I warmed up for a nice action movie. Those days, Chinese karate and American military and kickboxing movies were popular. And nothing else ran on TV or movie theatres. Then the association president took over and introduced the session. "Ladies and gentlemen, may what you are going to see today remain in your hearts forever." Really? I whispered. Movies for me were for pure entertainment. What would I take from a swift martial artist, who jumps from the bush, beats up some others and disappears behind another as mysteriously as he appeared? I thought. The lights went off and on the projector screen, lay my second life philosophy that I acquired that day. It read; Pay It Forward Pay it forward is a movie about a young heroic boy named Trevor. At school, the social studies teacher gave them homework titled, Think of an idea to change our world. The boy did not have any clue how he could change the world. When he was heading home from school that evening, he came across a homeless man. He was dressed in rags. He looked shaggy and unkempt. Eric looked at the man and thought; If I could take this man home, feed him and give him a place to stay, would I have changed the world? That evening, Trevor took in the man into their house, fed and housed him. When the man, asked Trevor what he could do for him, the boy replied; "Pay It Forward" Trevor shared his idea with his teacher and classmates. His idea was that if he could help three people, the three would pay it forward by helping others and the cycle will continue. The three people what he chose to help was his mother, the homeless man, and a friend who was getting bullied. The Pay it Forward movement started spreading. The homeless man paid it forward to a suicidal woman, The mother paid it forward by forgiving her mother and mending their relationship. The teacher paid it forward by helping Trevor's mother get off the booze. This got the attention of a journalist who traced the movement back to Trevor. The journalist interviewed Trevor and aired the interview on national TV. That afternoon, as Trevor was heading home, he found bullies harassing his friend. This was the third person he had vowed to help get off the bullies. He ran for his rescue and got stubbed so badly that he died! Pay it forward was a tragedy. How bad! But the lesson has kept burning inside my heart, since 2001. As Trevor said during the interview, he had already lit his candle. And that candle he lit, is still burning inside my heart. At the end of the conference, we were offered candles and the facilitator lit his candle and used it to lit another on the far end. He whispered into the delegate's ear and within a few minutes, all of the candles in the room were lit. I was at the far end and the message that was whispered in my ear by my neighbor delegate, just before she lit my candle, has kept my heart burning up to today. A friend of mine once told me that a candle does not lose its light by lighting another candle. Remember to Pay It Forward. |
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This blog post was published on 05 Feb 2020 in Inspiration category. Access all the posts at Blog |