Do you care?
What’s the last thing you said, “I DON’T CARE,” about?
Does it really matter whether you care or not about anything?
You bet!
In fact you actually bet your life on it whether you recognize it or not!
We are walking, talking chemistry sets that literally are determining how we not only act and feel, but how others do the same because of how we, indeed, act and treat others.
It was a crowded Chipotle at lunch time. She and her three kids were in front of me in line and the small kids were not listening as they were running from her, squirming in her arms and shouting very loudly without any effects from her ‘shushing!’
When she finally made it to the register and pulled out her credit card to pay the bill, it was declined.
You could actually see her deflate like a spike in not-all-the-way-filled air balloon. She said more in a huff of exhaustion, “I’ll be right back. I have to go to the car and get some money.”
Gathering or rather, herding her kids, she went out the door to her car.
I never turned around to see where it was at. I was wondering if, maybe she wouldn’t come back, that somehow maybe it just wouldn’t be worth it.
I told the cashier to put the bill on mine and I paid it.
For every action there’s a reaction–NOT–there was two I didn’t expect.
The first was disbelief. The cashier actually didn’t believe that I was going to do that for this weary mom. In fact, she attempted to talk me out of it: “Sir, you don’t have to do that, it’s not necessary!”
I assured her that I knew I didn’t have to do it, but I actually WANTED TO DO IT!
“REALLY?” she asked.
I held on to my credit card until she looked up at me and looked me in the eye.
I said, “Ma’am, I know this is going to sound a little crazy, but I’m not really doing it for her. I’m doing it for me. You don’t know this, but I’m the most selfish customer you’ve ever waited on. Really…I’m doing this for me!”
SECOND REACTION: A huge, broad, quiet Smile across her face that would have made a plastic surgeon jealous.
I sat at my table and began eating and yes, Mom and kids came back in, with a brown, crumpled lunch bag of change.
With my head down, and glancing up lightly, I saw the lips of the cashier moving…I became an expert lip reader at this very moment.
She mouthed, “Someone paid for you.”
I heard the mom, amazingly through the loudness of the lunch crowd and her now crying kids, “W H O?”
The cashier just shrugged her shoulders and mom took her crumbled lunch bag and her bag of newly paid lunches and walked to the doors…kids still squirming, talking loud, and one even louder, crying.
She was smiling.
Her Chemistry set just got activated and for a moment that didn’t cost $15.79, but was literally PRICELESS, so did mine.
The heart I create–sometimes actually hold in my hands–is the very BEAT of my own.
Forget about Changing the World!
Get Your Compassion ON!
Become utterly SELFLESSLY SELFISH and change hearts…ultimately your very own!
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