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"Lunch provided," the invitation read. So there I was in yesterday's optional midday seminar entitled Lower Your Debt, Increase Your Savings, sitting in the back row pawing, as quietly as possible, through my boxed lunch for my oatmeal cookie.
Savings plan this, 401K that—not so sure what went on because 1. anything related to numbers makes my eyes glaze over and 2. I couldn't get over the ridiculousness of it all.
Of how some people have everything in the world while others have nothing, and while, being categorically closer to the first group, I can but don't do a thing for the second. And even if I did, how much could one person really do? A lot, probably, actually. "How much could one person really do" is a convenient excuse, if you want to know the truth. Here we are talking about saving money to live comfortably 50 years from now when we don't even know if there will be a 50 minutes from now. Meanwhile, someone somewhere needs to feed their kid right NOW. And here I am learning about how to "build wealth" and enjoying my free boxed lunch when, considering the need that's out there, I, and everyone else in this firm, and most of the people in this country are the last people who need free anything.
What if we created a World Pool? What if every able person in the world put 1 dollar in that pool? What if we transferred those billions (glazing...won't even try to calculate) to a needing region in India? What if we refilled the pool next month, and transferred that amount to Honduras? Refill...North Korea; refill...Zimbabwe; refill...Haiti; and so forth every month for a year, politics and logistics aside, no strings attached.
12 dollars from every living, able person on this planet (a sacrifice of three freakin Starbucks drinks per year)...the things, can you imagine?, the things we can do for 12 different countries in one year?
As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.
Proverbs 27:17
-----bank accounts----doing for the sake of resumes---convenient relationships----$3K purses----flashy cars----cosmetic surgery----self-indulgence-----ego----things, things, things----
There's this thread of ridiculousness that weaves through us all, and society holds the spool. What would happen if we decided to snip it and join the Peace Corps? Everyone. Collectively. What would that look like? What would the world look like?
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| | Posted 5/7/2008 6:54 PM - 51 Views
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