Use your powers for good

Use your powers for good!

This request, admonishment, battle cry is one of my favorite in working with my very intelligent students, and my own very intelligent kids.

We have a very scary world out there where we cannot leave our electronic toys out in sight in a locked car, where the news sometimes sounds like a horror movie, and we are very leery to allow our children out of our sight.

But, in reality, there are far more good things happening in this wide, wide world, and I am so happy for the fine men, women and youths who look beyond the scary to use their powers for good. I came across a Website for a great organization that’s name represents itself, Create The Good. While tooling around on www.CreateTheGood.org today, I read the stories of people from all ages and all walks of life using their powers for good in the world. My heart felt especially warm at the story of a young woman who referenced high school English reading assignment Reviving Ophelia by Mary Pipher. The book, Stephanie explained, shows how our culture can turn confident young girls into insecure adolescents. As a result of this literature and concern for her own little sister, Stephanie volunteers for Big Brother/Big Sister and mentors pre-adolescent girls.

A retired man who has a background in counseling, now volunteers his time to counsel former soldiers affected by Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. Lacy, through her Los Angeles area Bible study delivers sack lunches to the needy. There are many more inspiring stories on the Face Book page supporting this organization: http://www.facebook.com/createthegood?v=app_176011239081880.
When I was a very young girl, my maternal grandfather died after a valiant fight with Parkinson’s disease. After his death, my grandmother, left with two young sons, felt the despair of grief. As my mother tells the story, Grandma decided one day that the best way to feel better is to go out and make other people feel better. Her “power” was art, so she “used her powers for good” by painting hair brushes and handing them out at a nursing home. Seeing the happy and gracious faces eased her grief, and I sure the residents appreciated her gifts.

Excuses are so easy and valid in our busy and heavily laden lives. So, I really grabbed on to the motto of “Create The Good – Be a force for good whether you have five minutes, five hours, or five days.” I read about a woman who works for an agency in South Florida that that organizes volunteers over 55 to work with young students, do yard work and more. These volunteers are folks who have worked hard all their lives, I am sure done good time in volunteering, and now when they are in the golf and bingo season of life, they give their time to help others.

In reflecting on my grandmother’s hair brushes I recently decided I needed to find a place to use my powers. Now, finding a place to volunteer or give of ourselves is not difficult at all, nor is living in a new community any sort of excuse. I spend quite a bit of at home these days, and needed something I could do from home. So, after having lunch one day with Mary, a labor and delivery nurse, I asked her if the hospital needs knitted preemie caps. She told me that there were no volunteer organizations donating preemie caps, and they were greatly needed.

I looked up patterns for head covering for the tiniest of folks. They were so small, that they made me shudder. Mary’s words stuck with me – many of the tiniest do not survive and if a baby wears a hand-knit cap, the parents may take this gift home to have something their little baby wore. So, I knit in hopes that this little bit of wool can give a struggling little fighter warmth.

Last spring, while I still lived in the Nashville area, people came out from everywhere to help victims of the flood. Stories kept coming of the many people who gave up work time, risked their safety, rolled up their sleeves, and pants to work for those whose homes took in mucky water. One of my teaching colleagues told me of her mother who used her dry home to lay out her neighbors’ family pictures, used her dishwasher to clean muddy kitchen ware, and her washing machine to clean loads and loads of clothes and towels.

The stories go on, and when I hear of what a scary world we live in, I do get frightened – but think of the much greater majority of people out there using their powers to create a better world for all of us. Thanks.