Now here is a story with a good message! One day a father took his son hiking in the mountains. Sadly, the young boy took a fall, but he wasn’t hurt badly. However, it startled him and he cried out. To his surprise, he heard a voice from somewhere in the mountains repeating his cry. Curious, he looked around and yelled “Who are you?” And he received another answer – “Who are you?”
Angered by the response, he screamed, “Coward!” Again, he received yet another answer – “Coward!” He then looked to his father for an explanation, and his father told him to pay close attention; then his father yelled to the mountain “I admire you!”, and the voice answered – “I admire you!” The father yelled again “You are a champion!”, and the voice came back “You are a champion!”
The youngster was surprised but still didn’t quite understand, so his father explained. “People call this an echo, when your words reverberate back to you,” he said, “but really this is life. Nearly everything you say or do returns to you. Our life is simply a reflection of our own actions.”
We who know what an echo is generally think that echoes are only sounds, but here is an example of our actions also being echoes.
A high school teacher decided to honor each of her senior students by telling each one what a difference they had made. Calling each one to the front of the class one at a time, she said something positive about each one while she presented each one with a blue ribbon imprinted with gold letters that read “Who I Am Makes A Difference”.
Later she decided to do a class project to see what impact this kind of positive recognition would have within their community. She gave each student three more blue ribbons and instructed them to go out and give a ribbon to someone and say something “positive” about them. Then they, in turn, should do the same, passing along another encouraging comment to someone else.
One of the senior boys went to an executive in a nearby company and told him how grateful he was for this man’s patience in guiding him with his future career planning and how much it had helped him. He also gave him the remaining two ribbons and asked him to do the same – give a ribbon recognizing someone they admired.
Later that day, the exec visited his boss who was noted for being a grouchy fellow. He told him that he deeply admired him for being so creative and he admired his abilities. The executive pinned the ribbon on his boss’s lapel and asked him to do the same – reach out to someone who might need to hear some positive words, and keep passing it forward.
That night as his boss returned to his home, he went to his son’s room and gave him a blue ribbon, telling him about the school project that had brought all of this about.
“I want to honor you, son,” he said, “because my days are really hectic and I know I don’t pay a lot of attention to you; I sometimes yell about your grades and your room being a mess. I just want you to know how very important you are to me; you matter, although I may not show it often enough.”
Stunned, the boy broke down and sobbed and admitted that he had always felt he didn’t ‘measure up’ and had been a disappointment. Needless to say, this dramatically changed the relationship between this father and son!
When the results of this school project made it back to the classroom, everyone seemed to have learned a valuable lesson. The teacher’s innovative idea was a powerful teaching tool in the lessons of life. Passing out those blue ribbons had a great ripple effect! Perhaps we all need to be reminded to hand out blue ribbons a little more often and let others know how important they are to us and why.
The next time you make your voice heard, try to remember to say something positive to that person. Hopefully, it too will echo and be passed on!
Quote of the Week: “Life is an echo. What you send out – comes back. What you sow – you reap. What you give – you get. What you see in others – exists in YOU. Your life is an echo – It always gets back to you – so give goodness.” ~ Zig Ziglar
