CHAPTER EIGHT
THE RIPPLE EFFECT
“Strange, isn’t it? Each man’s life touches so many other lives.”
— Clarence the Angel, in It’s a Wonderful Life
One of the most compelling, universal human drives is the desire to feel that we make a difference — that because we were here, the world is a better place.
Doing better in business is great — but your business is only a fraction of you as a whole person. I started seeing that the slight edge could literally change people’s lives.
I believe we are all, each and every one of us, graced with a unique mix of talent, passion, and vision, and that we were put here to live that out on a grand stage. The purpose of the slight edge is to allow us to live out those talents, passions, and visions to their fullest potential. I believe we are here to learn and grow, and to become so abundant in belief in ourselves that we finally tap into the full potential of the greatness that is within us and share that greatness with the world. But that greatness comes with a price.
Growth creates abundance, and that abundance in turn creates responsibility. The more success we have, the more greatness we step into and the more abundance we experience, the more responsibility we have to the world around us. Achieving greatness — in anything — isn’t simply a matter of taking the steps that get you there. It’s also a matter of being willing to pay the price. And that price is responsibility.
I want the world to be better because I was here. I want my life, my work, my family to mean something. If you are not making someone else’s life better you are wasting your time. Your life will only become better by helping make other lives better.
- Will Smith
“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world.”
- Margaret Mead
When you create positive improvements in your life, you create positive ripples that spread out all around you, like a pebble of positivity dropped in a pond. Those ripples may not all be visible but just because you may not see them doesn’t mean they’re not there. They are, and their impact can be enormous. When you reach out and positively affect one other person through your interactions and words you create a slight change in that person, who is then more likely to reach out and positively affect someone else.
Simply put, one touches another, who touches another, who touches another.
Through your everyday attention to those simple positive actions, your happy habits and daily disciplines, you don’t only have an impact on yourself, you are also having a powerful impact on everyone around you. You become a better relative, a better friend, a better business associate, father, mother, son, daughter, brother, sister etc. which in turn creates a spreading positive impact on the world around you and society at large.
We are all having a ripple effect of some sort already, whether or not we realize it.
If we cultivate this slight edge habit of creating positive moments for all those who cross our paths, I believe it will in time create a shift in the negativity and indifference that so often greets us in the world.
With children it is often so much easier to take the path of least resistance — to let them eat that fast food they love rather than cook something healthy, to let them watch TV rather than read to them, to let them play video games rather than interact with them. But making the extra effort is so worth it.
Essential Points from Chapter Eight
* Everyone wants to know that they make a difference in the world—that their lives matter.
* Greater success also creates a greater responsibility to share that success with others.
* A single thoughtful, committed person can change the world.
* We are all having a ripple effect on others; the question is, what kind of ripple effect, negative positive, do we want to have?
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