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Where do you stand in the global economy? |
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An e-mail came along from a friend of mine just before Christmas. It is
an e-mail with a link to a website that calculates someone’s annual
income and how that measures with the rest of the world. When I went on
the site and entered my numbers, I am in the richest 1% of the world’s
population. It was startling and humbling at the same time. You can
enter your own numbers at the website
www.globalrichlist.com
What the website and the little exercise did for me was to offer a vehicle to understand how privileged I am. Humbling, eye opening and a cause for pause. When I slip into a scarcity mentality – there is not enough, we need more, I want something else – if I have courage, I go back to my place in the global reality of things. When sales, advertisements and marketing tell me how much I am missing, I try to return to the perspective from this experience. Even a Canadian earning only $5000 in a year is among the world’s wealthiest 15%. There is not a great deal that one person can do in the face of struggling markets, a very unstable financial outlook and continued unemployment/underemployment. We can make individual choices but one decision will not greatly influence the outcome of the financial markets and economic outlook of our country. Our lives are pretty small in the global web of life. And yet ... And yet, I hear stories of how one person is making a difference with how she shares her wealth and privilege. She makes a difference in someone else’s life because she chooses to care in very concrete, practical ways. Then there is the couple whose lives are changed by an encounter with someone in another part of the world and they return home different people, more grateful, generous and humble. Or the family who decides to participate in something that gives to other people while they are on holidays. Instead of taking a holiday, receiving all that a resort, cruise and exotic travel might offer, they give a holiday. They give so that someone else might receive. It becomes an unforgettable experience, and they grow in gratitude and compassion for others. There are inspiring stories all around us. You read about some of them on this website. What if this is the year your life and mine become part of something that makes a difference? When you visit the website and enter your numbers, pay attention to your response. It may have something to say to you, like it did to me. I don’t always like being challenged in the place of my privilege, but I am growing in the trust that I need to hear it anyway. Sometimes life’s great gifts arrive like that.
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