Alan Weiss, the great speaker and consultant, publishes a weekly "Monday Morning Memo" newsletter. I really like this morning's memo:
Someone allows me to turn left into Dunkin' Donuts in heavy traffic. A passerby tells me I've dropped something. A store clerk finds something out of stock in another store and gets it for me the next day. The lawn guys clear up some debris that has nothing to do with their work. A bill is $10.03 and the cashier says not to worry about the change which I don't have. Someone offers tickets to a performance which they can't use. These are the small deeds of a meaningful life. We don't need to be thanked, we don't need to "demand" that people reciprocate or prove they're "passing it forward." We simply treat each other in a manner consistent with civility and in a way we'd like to be treated. The more we brag in public that we've performed such deeds, the less meaningful they become, because they're done by us for us. But when we do them without self-regard just because they are the right thing to do we're contributing in a powerful way.
© Alan Weiss 2015. All rights reserved
