It is imperative that we decide in advance to do the right thing. When circumstances present themselves in the heat of the moment, we must already know what our response is going to be.
As I turned on NBC’s TODAY show [1] to watch the morning news, I was horrified to hear about the man who was pushed in front of a subway train and killed while others stood by watching and doing nothing to help. The news program interviewed Mr. Abbasi, a freelance photographerwho took photos of the incident. He said, “What really surprises me is people who were maybe 100 feet or 150 feet away from Mr. Han did not reach out to help him.”
I wasn’t there to witness this event, so I don’t feel I can pass judgment on any individual person without having all of the facts of what occurred. However, what this story did was to drive home the fact that in order for us to do the right thing in any situation we have to make our decision ahead of time that we will be the person who doesn’t hesitate. We will be the person who steps up and takes action and immediately lends a helping hand. We need to decide in advance to do the right thing.
How many times have we seen a person pulled off to the side of the road with a flat tire and thought to ourselves, “Someone else will stop to help them,” only to drive by without giving it a second thought? And how many times have we walked past a homeless person with a cardboard sign asking for help only to think to ourselves, “They would just buy alcohol with the money” as we pass without looking them in the eye?
I have always had the desire to be a good person in my life. However, for many years I would see someone on the side of the road needing help, and I would pause to consider whether I was going to stop and the next thing I knew I had passed the person by and my mind had kicked into justification mode, thinking, “Oh well. There are tons of other cars behind me that will surely stop and help, and I have already passed them now.”
Begger (Photo credit: pedrosimoes7)
One day I was walking along a street on the way to a business dinner with a wonderful gentleman named Buddy, who worked for Humana, one of my key clients at the time. As Buddy and I walked along the street, a stranger walked up to us and asked if we could help him by giving him money. I paused for a moment, thinking to myself, “Is it safe to give this man money, or is he a scam artist?” While I was still contemplating how I should react to the situation, Buddy, without pause, immediately responded by pulling out a $20 bill and handing it to the man. After the stranger thanked him and walked away from us, I started to explain to Buddy that I had been uncertain of whether it was safe to give the man money or whether the man was just pretending to be in need. Buddy’s next statement impacted my life more than he will ever know. He said, “I would rather be made a fool for helping a man who wasn’t in need, then to be made a fool for not helping the man who was.” His comment changed my life that day. Buddy was right; I would rather be the kind of person who made every attempt to help the person in need. It was in that moment that I committed to never again hesitate when it came to doing the right thing.
Making the decision in advance to do the right thing whenever I saw a person in need, has made all the difference in how I approach difficult situations. I no longer allow myself the ability to wait and make a decision in the heat of the moment, because I know that in that momentary pause I will either talk myself out of helping or I will start justifying all the reasons that I don’t need to help. I realize that momentary pause that occurs when we have not made a decision in advance typically stops us from doing the right thing. By making my decision to help ahead of time, I no longer have to think about it at all. I simply have to react.
If we want to be that person that makes a difference in the lives of others then we have to decide in advance that we are committed to stepping up the very second opportunities present themselves. We have to know how we will react before the situation occurs, otherwise we will pause and the opportunity to help may pass us by.
Sometimes in life we don’t get a second chance to make a difference in a person’s life. For those people who witnessed that man being struck by the subway and didn’t help, they will never have the chance to relive that moment. They will never have another chance to make a difference in his life. Perhaps some of them were experiencing that momentary pause thinking to themselves, “Surely someone else will help him,” or “Should I be the one to help him?” I can only imagine the angst those individuals will have to live with as they relive that moment over and over again wondering, “What if I hadn’t hesitated?” Would Mr. Han still be with us today? Their pain is only trumped by the pain that the family of that man must be feeling tonight. My prayers go out to everyone involved in this tragedy. May we all learn from what happened. May we all learn from the examples of the “Buddys” in this world. May we rather be made a fool for helping a man who wasn’t in need, then to be made a fool for not helping the man who was in need. And finally, may we decide in advance to do the right thing, and then act without hesitation. God bless.
~Amy (for my daily blogs go to www.amyreesanderson.com/blog)
