The Eternal Question: Do I have Value?

There comes a time in everyone’s life when they begin to wonder exactly why they are here on earth, what is their purpose, why were they born? It can come at any time of life. While just starting out on life’s journey, meeting with a crisis in midlife, or even faced with the negative aspects of aging—losing parents, loved ones and special friends to the ravages of time. But no one is spared from these thoughts at some time or another in their life. Moreover, one’s own mortality is always a hard concept with which one must deal at some point in life.

For me, the most recent and powerful moment when I thought about the value of my own life was just this past week as I recovered from surgery.

Value to humanity and purpose of life go hand in hand when we reflect on how we both individually and collectively benefit society. Our specific talents, the ones that we are born with and that make us the happiest, must be recognized first, by ourselves, so that they might then be utilized to the benefit of those around us. If you took a moment right now and thought about it, you would probably come to the conclusion that the most successful people in the world are those who have identified their talent and have maximized it for the well-being and happiness of others. Striving for that perfect place, that perfect job, that perfect service, is what helps us all to live relatively happy lives. But before we can become the most benefit to society we must discover that special talent that we were born to use.

Believe it. Most people in our society are helping others every day, using their specific talents, regardless to the fact of whether they realize it or not. Whether they choose to accept that the job they are performing is important or not is directly related to the way they were raised and the attitudes of those around them. Some tasks that are done for the benefit of others may not appear on the surface to be important or even relevant, but can you think of what this world would be without those personal talents?

Some years ago, I worked as an accounts representative for a large industrial chemical company that specializes in the development and manufacture of cleaning products. It was my task to work with a network of distributors in my assigned sales territory, helping each of their sales forces to have knowledge of our product line and to then sell our products to their end user clients. One of the distributor sales reps that I worked with had as a client, the National Institutes of Health (NIH), located in Bethesda, Maryland which is right outside of Washington, DC.

NIH had asked my colleague to come and address the staff of custodial and housekeeping personnel that cared for Building #10 on the NIH campus. Building #10 is the actual NIH hospital where there is not only a great deal of medical care provided, there is also a great deal of medical research taking place. My colleague asked me if I would like to use this opportunity to share product information with the more than 200 custodians that would be present and of course I agreed immediately.

On the day of the presentation, I sat in the audience with the 200+ custodians as one vendor after another paraded across the stage attempting in their allotted time of five minutes, to extol the virtues of their respective products. I quickly became aware of the fact that at least half of the audience was asleep and the other half did not care. I did not know what I was going to say when it became my turn, but I knew it would not be a sales pitch.

As I walked out onto the stage, I still did not know what I was going to say. And then, it occurred to me exactly what I would say. I asked each of the audience to stand up, stretch and shake the hand of the person next to them. At least, they were now all awake. Then, when they had all resettled into their seats I asked them to close their eyes and to imagine Building # 10 seven days from that day. I asked them to imagine that within that seven day period, not one of them had reported to work and that NIH had been totally unsuccessful in replacing any of them. Consequently, during those seven days, not one trash can had been emptied; not one patient room had been cleaned; not one bathroom had been cleaned; not one hallway had been mopped, waxed or buffed; not one operating room had been cleaned, mopped or disinfected.

As this vision took shape in their mind’s eye, an audible response began to develop. Some of the audience chuckled while others almost gasped in horror. After about 10 or 15 seconds, I asked them to open their eyes and when I felt I had their full attention, I said to them, “Never again let anybody treat you as if your job is not important or has value. Never again let anybody ignore you because it is their position that you do not play an integral part in the cleanliness, safety or success of this institution. You are all important—terribly important and my job is to provide you with the cleaning tools and resources you need to help keep the patients who come here healthy and safe.” I walked off to a huge round of applause and there have been few moments in my professional life since that day when I have felt as good about what I do as I did that morning.

I can ask you the same question today about those hardworking folks in NIH? Are any of them less important to society than the corporate executive or the doctor that we hold so reverently in our lives? This person goes to work every day, doing the same job, and the impact of what they do may have more influence on our lives than members of our own family. Their value to the overall good of society cannot be diminished by the title of their chosen profession. They are, just as anyone is, using the talents (reliability, strength, determination and for some humility, to name a few) that they have been given. They are of great value to humanity. They are no less important than the lawyers and other professionals who benefit financially from our problems. They make our everyday lives easier and safer and provide each of us with more time to devote our talents to the rest of humanity.

As I have spent this past week resting (and yes, working from home), it has become clearer to me than ever before, that all of us, each and every one of us, has an impact on humanity. So, to those of you, who sincerely dislike their job or how you spend your free time, change it! You have every right and responsibility to do so. Conversely, if you are happy and fulfilled at what you do, then you will increase the joy and goodwill of those around you.

In past blog postings, I have written about the cruelty and visceral nature of the political environment in our country today. It is time to change that. It is time to build a society in which people are allowed and even encouraged to be nice to one another.

To some degree, I have learned the need for nice from my wife who is one of the nicest and sweetest human beings I have ever known. In the beginning, I assessed this niceness from her as something weak, something that would make others think that she was fodder for their frustrations and anger. While I have shared with her strategies on how to dissuade people from trying to take advantage of her, she has never stopped being nice to people—even nice to me when I probably least deserve it. Her reasoning seems to support the belief that we are in constant contact with other people a great deal of the time, so our impact should be an epidemic of mass proportions—ensuring that it is a good epidemic of courtesy and kindness.

Common courtesy is one of the most beneficial methods of promoting a community that is healthy and balanced. When someone greets you in a pleasant manner, when the door is held open for you—even if only for an instant, your life is impacted in some special way. This just means that your value to humanity is as simple as making another person’s life nicer.

This is a time of crisis in our country and crisis demands something from each of us. And that something is that we not only recognize that we have talents but that we accept the responsibility of doing something with those talents for that is what counts in the final analysis.

It is also critical, that as we move together as a nation that we demonstrate daily our understanding of what it means to be a human being with all the responsibility that entails. It is imperative that we then transform that understanding into action—leading by example—living up to what has been bestowed upon us as part of an overall effort of making our country and our planet a better place. Doing this will require a group effort. For the greatest benefit however, the best place to start that is within ourselves, letting others help us while reciprocally helping them on the road to happiness and fulfillment each of us so rightly deserve and that society so desperately needs.