“You Don’t Have To Do Any Grand Gesture”

Wood heart Photo by Nick Fewings on Unsplash

Last year, we were looking at the possibility of moving to France for my husband’s job.  While waiting to see if we would get that opportunity a friend, who knows of my interest in refugees, shared a video her friend made in Paris about refugees and some of the people who help them.

I have wanted to share that video here since first starting my blog, but I have always wanted this place to be safe for those who are seeking peace. Some of the scenes in the video could be much worse than they are, but they still may not be easy for some to see.  I also wanted this blog to be a place of compassion, encouraging others to be empathetic and that can sometimes be difficult to do without sharing the people for whom we should have empathy.

Last night, I talked with a tenderhearted woman, T,  who was donating a meal for a refugee family who will arrive here in the States, tired and hungry, later today.  She described herself as living in a bubble.  She told me how she doesn’t watch the news but has mixed feelings about that because she wanted to teach her children why they should give and serve and knew she needed to know why in order to teach them.

Meal given to a refugee family out of love

She asked me many questions about how to do the meal (and other things) because she wanted it to be “perfect”.  She may have said “perfect”, but listening to her, I feel she really meant she wanted to ease the refugee family’s burdens, lift their loads and leave them feeling all the love in her heart.

This morning I started thinking of the video again.  I’ve thought of it dozens of times since I started the blog, but today it feels right to share it.  After watching it again, I understood why – so much of it reminded me of my sweet conversation with T.

It would be well worth your time to watch the whole thing, but if you would like to pass by scenes that may be hard for you please forward the video to 18:07 and watch from there.

It is this line from the video that most caught me when I first watched it, “I think our biggest takeaway was that you don’t have to do any grand gesture to affect change in the world, but we should always be asking, ‘what are my barriers to helping those I see in need?'”

And that’s exactly what I saw in  T last night.  She was asking this question of herself, but she wasn’t just asking.  She was taking a chance by first signing up to donate a meal. How I love that she was willing, as the video says,  to “stumble”.

Open Heart Photo by cyrus gomez on Unsplash

Have you stumbled when trying to help someone?  What did it teach you?