Significant lives
In this hectic world, it is easy to loose your identity in the masses. A lot of people feel their lives are without orientation or destiny; that if things continue as they have, all that they are will be forgotten the very moment they seize to exist. “I should be doing something, working towards some ultimate goal. I have accomplished nothing.” This thought is a dismaying one. Whenever I find myself going in that direction, I draw back to my old image of a ripple in a pond…
A stone hits water and starts a ripple just by being in that place at that time. The ripple keeps enlarging and enlarging. It changes the whole landscape just by being, and the effects of it cover more and more ground by the second. It doesn’t matter if the stone is a big rock or just a mere pebble. The ripples always form. Maybe a person, too, changes the world just by being here.
It is impossible to judge the consequences of our actions. Any inconsequential act can have major results. For example, an apple tree you plant today can save a man from starving to death in a hundred years. The possibility of this particular example is remote, but the point remains - it is impossible to judge the amplitude of consequences without omniscience. The idea of someone not accomplishing anything is absurd.
If you’re troubled by having no orientation in your life, remember that you do make a difference just by existing, by being who you are. Every conversation you have with someone else imprints new thoughts onto their minds. Social relations of any variety follow the rules of action and reaction. Even humans form ripples by just being; rock and pebble alike.