Worry is misuse of the imagination.
Mary Crowley
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Goodness Invitation Stories
There are four very short stories on this page. The purpose of these stories
is to create a desire in you to learn how to do more good. If you are interested, email us at info@all-around.org and we will send
you materials for a Short Course in Goodness. This may enable you to do 10 to 100 times more good.
Hold the Pattern Together
Two men were each given a hen, a rooster and a large bag of feed. One man killed and ate first the hen, then the rooster. Then he picked the corn out of the feed, boiled and ate it, and threw the rest away. The second man built a pen for the two chickens and fed them daily. He ate and traded fresh eggs for a month, while he took some of the feed and planted it. He used the eggs to buy tools and things he didn't have. While the pair produced baby chicks, the crop grew and within a year he had a chicken farm and a means of producing more feed through the seeds he had planted.
Comment: The All Around Program or any multipurpose "superprogram" can be crudely used and its "food" potential quickly exhausted,
or it can be used intelligently and provide "food" for hundreds or thousands of people for years. The Short Course in Goodness may teach you the greater pattern.
Would You Want This Surgeon Operating on You?
Imagine that a surgeon is taught some improved medical procedure that will save many more lives.
Now suppose that at the end of the training the surgeon says: "Even though I understand why these new procedures
are more effective, I'm more comfortable with the old way of operating. Besides, I enjoy doing things the old way—It's become
my style!" Obviously, this would be a strange attitude for a surgeon to take. In fact, it might even cause the surgeon to lose his or her license if a patient died. But while such an attitude is unthinkable in a surgeon, it is quite common in people who are introduced to improved methods of doing good. Most people prefer to do a good deed that they are comfortable
with rather than learn to do an unfamiliar yet strategic action that can produce more good.
Hold the Pattern Together, Part II
A man decided to try to make the world a better place. When he asked people to help him, they told him they were too busy. So he came up with a strategy. First, he would teach them time-management skills. That way, they would have the time to help him and they'd probably be grateful too, because they could use some of their newfound time for their own projects. So he devised a one-day seminar, and each weekend for six months he worked with a different group.
At last, he felt that he was ready to gather some of the people he had taught and ask them to help him with his world-improving project. He called a woman in the first group and asked for her help. She told him how grateful for his help she was. So he felt encouraged and told her about a project that he'd like her to help with.
"That's impossible," she said.
"But didn't I help you free up two hours a day?!"
"Yes, but at the time I was only working and taking care of the kids. Now, however, in addition to that, I'm taking Spanish lessons on Mondays, leading the choir on Wednesdays, and fundraising for my son's little league team on Saturdays, and playing Bingo with my girlfriends on Sundays. You should have asked me months ago when you taught me time-management, because unless you have some brand new ideas, my schedule is totally grid locked!"
Comment: People will often take the capacity-building parts of a program and use them as they like. Unfortunately, in this case, if you take them
from All Around Program, it will prevent much of the good that could have been done. That's why we require people to read our Use Policy.
We know that some people will ignore this. But eventually a greater pattern like the one was illustrated in first story will become well known, and then many people will recognize that the materials were in effect
stolen.
Three Environmentalists
One environmentally-minded person tried to recycle every scrap of paper. In a year he spent approximately 15 minutes a week, for a total of about 13 hours, saving 400 pounds of paper.
A second environmentalist was walking down a sidewalk eating a sandwich with her friends. A strong wind blew away a plastic bag that she was also holding. Her friends were surprised that she made no effort to play catch-up with the bag as it raced down the block. But two minutes later, when they came within sight of a trashcan, she picked up a plastic bag, two candy wrappers and a plastic soda bottle from the sidewalk and threw them in the trashcan. She turned to her friends and said, "On balance, the world is cleaner."
A third environmentally-minded person calculated the amount of paper that she used in a year. She did not recycle, and she produced about 500 pounds of paper waste in a year. Taking 15 minutes, she sent a $25 check to a tree-planting organization that would plant 150 trees with her money. The trees would eventually produce 200,000 pounds of paper, not to mention the tons of carbon dioxide they would absorb and the oxygen they would create.
She never had occasion to mention her annual donation, and so most of her friends thought she was a hypocrite.
Comment: This story was designed for a discussion group, but notice that the third person does about 500 times more good than the first person and takes less time. This is why we are not exaggerating when we say that the Short Course in Goodness may increase the good you do tenfold or a hundredfold.
Thank you for taking the time to read these stories. To receive the free Short Course in Goodness or ask about it, email us at info@all-around.org and request it. We plan to have the course ready by January 1, 2004. Now, please read the Use Policy if you haven't already done so.
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