There are times when I wonder whether my existence matters and how well the world would go on without me. There have been so many writers, scientists, philosophers, inventors, global leaders—people who have had a huge effect on the world around them, people who have changed the face of everything as we know it. Then I think about myself and how small I seem in the shadow of their monumental deeds.
After all, what am I doing with myself? I’m going to law school (a profession that disgusts a lot of people) and earning grades just high enough to keep me enrolled. (Well, I shouldn’t say that—I’m ranked 168th in my class and there are 178 students in the class overall, so I’m doing a little better than just high enough.) I try to spend time with my family, but if I wasn’t around, it seems like there aren’t too many people who would suffer from the loss. It seems like I don’t make all that much difference, like I could just as easily have been a cosmic mistake that got lost in the rabble and has yet to be cleaned up.
Then I think about Boy Scouts and how I’ve tried to set a good example as both an Eagle Scout and an Assistant Scoutmaster. I think about how people have enjoyed reading articles I’ve written for the school newspaper as well as my performances in school plays and speech tournaments. I even think about people like Sadie, a person I met by driving to school at the right time. All I did was push the back of her car, denting the trunk in the process, but we got it out of the snow so she could get to wherever she was going that morning.
It might feel like I haven’t reached any great heights and I haven’t made the most of all the opportunities I’ve been given in my life, but it also feels like, in some small degree, I’ve made the world a better place. Seeing people smile, making them laugh, watching them grow… those are the rewards that make me want to do more. Those are the rewards that make our efforts worthwhile. Those are the rewards that show what a person has truly accomplished—anything else could be just another cosmic mistake.
“The charity that is a trifle to us can be precious to others.” – Homer
