If Not Higher

One of my favorite tales is a short story about 100 years old or more called "If Not Higher" by I.L. Peretz. It is a story often paraphrased to demonstrate that the good work that people do often goes unnoticed. I would love to include the story here but it is so much better when told live by an actual storyteller that I can only encourage you, at the very least, to find it on the web and read it before you continue reading here to get the true feel for the story and its power. http://joi.org/celebrate/rosh/higher.shtml

What I can do here though is discuss the meaning of the story. In short – a skeptic comes to find out that the high praise people have for a man doing good work is not high praise enough, thus causing his skepticism to melt away and offer his own praise of the man only now with far greater understanding.

Why I love this story is because we would all like to be the man deserving of praise, yet we all know that we spend so much of our lives being the skeptic. The longer we are skeptical of the world and people around us the harder and harder it is to get it to melt away. And having it melt away is an incredible feeling. Letting that happen means that in some way you are releasing your own inhibitions and allowing yourself to trust or have faith in something or someone else.

As someone who has been and continues to be a skeptic about a great many things and people on a regular basis, I am also someone who historically has let that skepticism melt away all too easily. But lately that has not been the case. And by lately I mean the past couple years. Don't get me wrong, I actually really want to believe in people. Though it has been tough because in the society we are continuously finding ourselves in it is all too easy to lose faith in people. Whether it is their lack of consideration, their selfishness, their smugness, their elitism or their fanaticism they are too busy or self-involved to "do the right thing".

Now who am I to lay down the gauntlet of what the "right thing" to do is? I'm not anybody other than an observer of the human condition like so many of the rest of us. So please feel free to vehemently disagree with me, I need that.

I'll say this – the right thing to do is to actually see and hear and listen to people. We've all heard that most people in a conversation are actually just waiting for their turn to speak rather than listening. We need to be listeners and we need to look for more people to listen to all the time.

It's kind of interesting that as I write this I am thinking about the way technology has integrated into our lives, how many people see it as complicated but all it is trying to replicate what we do as humans. Take the latest craze/wave/innovation of "Cloud Computing" in a nutshell (and let me know if I get this wrong) it is the combination of information one can gather on the internet through multiple sources to create a comprehensive idea or program or application or sales lead or whatever. It is understanding that all the data from all these different companies is on the web (in the cloud) and you can use other web-based applications to pull data from all of them as it corresponds or correlates to the idea or project that you are working on. Simpler. Cloud Computing is like having your own personal Jeopardy Champion in the room with you. The champ has info on everything so if the category is mid-century stamp collecting you are going to be able to pull info on collecting, postal service, stamps and stamp subject matter, the 1950's and 60's, etc. That's the cloud.

Another tech innovation a few years ago was the Network of Workstations or also called NOW. This was a predecessor to the cloud idea in that you would use many brains to create a super-brain. The techno equivalent of 2 or more heads are better than one (without the egos).

So that's what we need to do as people and I believe that using technology to do it is very helpful, but we just can't let it get us away from connecting with people as people. All too often we are now only connecting to people as profiles.

Another crazy example. I worked at a large company and had my office on the top floor of the building. When II chose to take the elevator there might be a few other people in the elevator with me that I didn't know (it was a big company) if I did not know them we would rarely speak for the entire elevator ride. Why? I am guessing that we assumed the other person was too busy to chat, or the ride would be too short to have a conversation, or we were too self-absorbed to want to chat, or assumes that of the other person. At work, in the elevator, we were merely profiles of ourselves, not people. Here is where it gets interesting and this actually did happen to me. My wife and I were invited to a dinner party through her work. I knew no one there but as it turned out another spouse who knew no one there either also worked for the company I did. As it turned out we had even shared a silent elevator ride multiple times. Yet we had never spoken. We were inseparable for the entire dinner party. We barely talked about work but we connected on about 10 other levels and both had a great time. We were now people and not profiles.

Of course by now, if you are still reading, you are expecting me to move into the "do the right thing, volunteer, treat people right, invest in your community, blah. Blah, blah" but once again let me try to make this less preachy and more practical.

By truly tuning in to people, by finding out who they are and not being afraid to reach out and get to know them or give them a glimpse of who you really are – you strengthen your own "cloud". Does that sound self-serving enough for today's environment?

Wait a minute - It pays to get to know people and let them get to know you?

Let's go back to the short story "If Not Higher" (have you read it yet?) Does either the man of praise or the skeptic think of the selfish ways their good work or high praise of another will serve them? The skeptic might as in the end of the story he becomes more pious and his believe and faith are strengthened by his observance of the other man's actions. Perhaps he is thinking now that his faith will serve him better and that he can use it to repent for his skepticism and be rewarded in whatever stage of his life comes next. No one would claim that the other man believes he is being served by this in any way. His service is to a higher power by way of the things he does in the story. And he does not serve that higher power for any greater reward than the satisfaction of knowing that he did a good thing, one might argue "the right thing".

So, if we as human beings who share the planet everyday of our lives with over 6 billion other people can find a way to get to know each other as people, can take the time to listen to each other's needs and see what we can do for each other to get those needs met – maybe, just maybe the society we live in can get a little more connected, a little more inspirational, a little less cynical and self-serving. Go ahead - try it. You may find it lifts your spirit to the clouds…if not higher.