30 Seconds Changed My Life
I wasn’t a bad kid, I just couldn’t sit still in class, Dr. Charlie Harry said about himself.
In high school, they had a program where older students helped younger ones; it was a big deal. You didn’t have to teach complicated math, but if you were a bad influence, they wouldn’t let you help either.
When they put up the list of those who made it into the helping category, I looked for my name.
Almost everyone made it, but my name wasn’t on the list.
I didn’t understand why, but it then hit me: maybe the school thinks I’m a bad kid, a bad influence. I was so hurt, I went home early, completely broken and shattered.
Later that day, I got a call from a teacher who taught me three years earlier. We haven’t kept up, so I was surprised.
But that 30-second call changed my life.
He said, “Charlie, I saw they didn’t pick you. They missed it. You’re a very good kid; you just have a hard time sitting still. How did they not see that?” That was the whole phone call.
Then I went to learn in Eretz Yisroel, and many times I had to make decisions about what to do that would affect my entire spiritual life. Even though my mother was amazing, I kept hearing this teacher in my head: “Charlie, I see you – you are a good kid.” Those words changed my life.
A 30-second call from this teacher saved me from thinking I was bad and a bad influence.
What’s the lesson? Dr. Charlie Harry said the powerful lesson himself:
Everyone around you is begging someone to notice them.
One of the greatest gifts we have is our ability to see. Use them to see the greatness in your friends and family.
If looking and believing in who they can be, they can feel it, and you may be unlocking a piece of them that would never have been unlocked without you!
This connects to this week’s Parshah:
Avraham Avinu saw some guests, but then realized they were too uncomfortable to come over, so he ran to invite them. We learn from Avraham to see and think more deeply about how to help others. Like Mr. Charlie Harry's teacher, one can never know the impact!
Lot was saved from Sodom and was told not to look back at the destruction. Lot’s wife didn’t listen and looked back at Sodom, and because she looked, she turned into a pillar of salt. Why did Lot’s wife turn specifically into salt?
30 Seconds Changed My Life
From Braun Answers: I heard from Rav Moshe Wolfson shlita, it’s not written openly that we shouldn’t think Hashem chose Avraham and Klal Yisroel only because of these actions of sacrificing himself/mesiras nefesh, and then if chas veshalom Klal Yisroel doesn’t act like that, we lose the chosenness. No. We are forever His nation.
Our essence is from Avraham, who was an innate essence of goodness. We are good and righteous, and any actions contrary to that are only exterior dirt – but not from our essence – from Avraham.
That is the whole story of how Avraham Avinu was put to prison for ten years and was willing to be thrown into a fire rather than bowing down to avodah zarah – not written openly in the Torah?
