What are you adding to the world?  Pause between texting a friend to meet for coffee and running to the store to consider.  Everyone has daily obligations that take up so much of the limited time available.  But in the end, the very end, what has each of us done to make this place different as a result of our existence?

Many would point to having children and the lasting legacy of future generations.  Once a life is added to the universe it ceases to be the accomplishment of the parent and becomes the achievements of the offspring.  There are certainly the careers that put one in the position of having an impact on one or many.  Most of us will never have a direct effect on world peace or any of the other global problems.  But the actions of the one; the effort to really make a difference, can have the ripple effect to carry it far beyond individual reach or imagination.  The small daily kindness, really seeing a stranger and their need, touching another with the best part of yourself, all have lasting results.

Stepping outside of one’s routine to create opportunities to give some piece of yourself is soul stretching and feeds the inner happiness in ways that little else offers.  Put down the coffee and the phone and ask yourself, what, right now, can I do that will make a difference?