When we're talking about helping the world, it sounds like a tall order.  It's a big world out there, and the problems can make ordinary people look small.  But there's a lot that you can do.

Since most people think of this subject in terms of charitable giving, let's start by talking about that.  What can you do?

For starters, you can get choose a cause, and donate.  Choosing is actually the important part.  Unless you choose a charity, you'll just be overwhelmed by the variety of them out there. The best way to make this choice is to find some cause that means something to you personally, and give to that.  For my part, I like the MS Society, and the University of Michigan, so these are the two organizations that benefit the most from my giving.

You don't have to give money, though.  A lot of non-profits have work done by volunteers.  Agian, to use a personal example, I pack food at a food bank about every two months.  I got involved with them about 2 years ago, after I met the food bank's secretary at my work (I'm in advertising; she was delivering some material to a coworker of mine at the ad company).  When I saw what she did, I thought it'd be nice to help, and she told me to just come on down.  They put me to work packing up grocery boxes for their clients, and I've been going back about every 7 or 8 weeks ever since.

Finally, you can take a look around yourself.  Look at your neighborhood, or at the park bench where you're eating lunch, or at the bus stop outside your work, or even just at the sidewalk in front of your house.  What's there?  Are there bits of trash around?  Is the grass unkempt?  Are people tossing cigarette butts in the gutter?  These are all easy things to "fix," if only someone simply would....

So why not be that someone?

As a child, people would ask me what I wanted to do when I grow up.  My answer was always the same, "I'm going to save the world".  The response was also always the same idea, "Good for you", "How mature of you", "Such a noble cause", "I'm so proud of you".

Then, around the age of 17, the responses began to change.  They went from being proud to giving me the "You'll grow out of it", "You can't make a difference in the world" and they're faces would give off the 'she's delusional' attitude.

I didn't care what they thought; I knew that I was going to save the world.  Then one day in college, I read a quote, which I couldn't tell you if my life depended on it but generally stated that it wasn't the grand ambitions of saving the whole world that made a difference, but the small actions of helping the world around you (i.e. ripple makes a wave).  I took that statement to heart.

My goal never changed.  I want to make this world a better place, and I am willing to dedicate my life to this cause.  What did change was my way of achieving my goal.  I know that I can't get rid of nukes, stop global warming, end starvation, terrorism, hate, etc, single handedly.  What I do know is that I can help to make the world around me, my little world, a better place.  I also know that my actions, in effect, will make a difference in ways that I will probably never know, nor do I really care to.

I have spent my entire life trying to help in any way possible, whether with a single person, school, city state, or country.  To some of my actions I have seen the fruit, to others, I haven't (not to say there wasn't, I just didn't see it).  If I had listened to the overt and underlying messages of just about every person I spoke with, if I had taken them seriously, I don't know what the world I live in would be like today.  What I do know is that I would be a lot less happy?and a lot more like the way that society attempted to mold me.

I'm not saying fight the power, I'm saying believe in yourself, not what others tell you that you are and should be.  If not, you will never be satisfied and the world would have a very hard time being a better place (It can't do it alone, you know?).

I've decided to blog with a theme, and the theme is, 'Helping the world.'

What does that mean, exactly?  There are a lot of different interpretations.  You can look at it the way that Greenpeace does, and try to protect every endangered species, or the way the Sierra Club does, and try to protect the environment, or you can take the classical Jewish approach, and simply try to leave the world as a better place than you found it.

Actually, that last doesn't sound like a bad idea at all.  If everyone did that, worked to make the world a little bit better, imagine how many issues could be solved.  But what would it entail?  Are there projects we can work on, to improve what we find around us?  And what parts of the world need helping, and how do we recognize them?

Some of these questions are easy, some are not, and some may have no answer at all, but they all need to be asked.  We can ask them of ourselves, or our friends, or even our enemies, and hopefully, we'll find some answers.  Answers, however, are not always required in order to "help the world."

In this blog, I want to explore ways to do that.  I want to look at ways to answer the questions, and ways to help the world around us, and ways that even one person can make a difference.  I'll invite you to comment, and share your thoughts as I am sharing mine.  It's my hope that the discussion will generate ideas.

I am an idealist.  No question about it.  I am realistic enough to live in this world, but I cannot accept it for what it is.  The world can be a much better place, if we just put in the tiniest of efforts.  I was called out on being an idealist with the blog I wrote about the Sudanese refugees.

I wear that badge proudly.  I may not have all of the answers, or most of them for that matter.  I may not be in the position to help everything all of the time, and I may be looked upon as living behind a set of rose colored glasses.  Nonetheless, I believe.  Strongly.  I believe that there are other people like me out there.  I know I can make a change, and I know that I can impact every single person I meet,  I know I control my life and the good and the bad that I make of it.

I know that I have the power to make a difference.  And I take full advantage of that knowledge.  Because of the fact that I know that I, and only I control my world then I can certainly make it as good or as bad as I want.  It's my choice.

I may not have all of the answers about where to put the refugees or how they should be absorbed into other countries in the world, but I do know that we have the power as a country and citizens to help those refugees, if we only chose to.  I am not saying the answer is simple, but there is always and answer.  It just needs to be found.

I believe, and like the great Dr. King said so famously, "I have a dream"!

We spend way too much time measuring ourselves up to others.  Whether it is style, fashion, successes or failures, we are always checking against the measure of others to see where we stand.

Thank goodness that God doesn't judge the way that we do.  If so, we would've all been struck down thousands of years ago - probably way before the notion of monotheistic religion came into the picture.  Phew!

We are always looking to others to see where we stand, where the only measure we can truly count ourselves up against is ourselves.  We can strive to be as good, beautiful, rich, happy as others; but we never will.  There will always be someone else that one-ups us.

When pondering whether or not I am ever going to be a truly "good" person, I was told that it doesn't matter who I am, when I arrive at the gates of heaven.  If I did the best I could do with what I had, that is what counts and it doesn't matter if I was like Abraham or Moses.  We are each our own form of unique, and that is great.

I may not believe in heaven per say, but I certainly know that I am the best me that I can be.  And nobody can take that away from me with their skewed measurement system.

Try to keep an eye on your thoughts and actions.  Be proud of who you are and work with what you have - you don't need to prove yourself to anyone but yourself.

I feel the need to continue on what I wrote last week, but more as an offshoot of a topic that came up rather than the issue of the refugees themselves.