Changing 'A' World is the path to changing 'the' world

​I think sometimes the noble dream of 'changing the world' stands in our way of changing a lot of individual worlds.

Before I went to bed last night, I listened to my friend Kel share an experience she'd had while traveling out west. She'd been driving a long time. She was tired. She was sad; it was her deceased mom's birthday.

Kel was in the middle of nowehere South Dakota. She pulled into a Love's truckstop and found the first spot she could find to get a little rest.

As she was sitting there, she noticed a woman in a car next to her. Kel got out of her car, got the woman's attention and told her, every year on my mom's birthday I give someone $100 whom I think might need it. Kel told the woman she wanted to give her the $100.

The woman got out of the car, embraced Kel in a hug that felt like it might never end. She was sobbing. Then she told Kel, I've been sitting in my car praying to God for a way to eat. It was 4:30 in the afternoon and the woman had not eaten.

Kel gave the woman the $100. Kel changed that woman's world.

Here is a powerful part of Kel's story. Maybe the most powerful part. Kel said giving the woman $100 helped her release the sadness she felt about her mom. Helping that woman helped her.

Sometimes I think we forget the power that's found in helping one another. We are not wired to change the world; we are wired to change one another's worlds. Maybe if we got as enamored with the call to change the lives of the individuals around us as we are with the dream of changing the world - that dream might actually have a chance of coming true.

There are a lot of people in the world who get forgotten when we look over them out into the giant, endless world we want to change.

I think it might be helpful to reduce the size of the world we want to change.

Maybe reduced it to your town.

Or the place you work.

Or your neighborhood.

Maybe reduce it to the size of the parking spot next to you at a truck stop.

I love the idea of changing the world. Maybe today we all pick one world we want to change.