Seeking a meaningful life is part of what makes us human. It's why volunteers drive ambulances and fight fires, why donors give blood and pledge their organs, why moms and dads coach Little League and serve on community boards, why professionals mentor those learning their trade or craft, why you may work at the soup kitchen or raise money for your place of worship. Happily, there is no imperative to be rich, or even religious, before stepping up to a life of purpose.
I have had a long relationship with Habitat for Humanity. Years ago I had the good fortune to work on a build with President Jimmy Carter, whose greatest work has come after his presidency and has been mostly centered on giving back to the global community. Carter has become the face of Habitat since his first involvement in 1984. He raises funds and awareness and once a year takes part in the Jimmy Carter Work Project "blitz build." In 2006, for example, Carter and two thousand volunteers built 101 homes in impoverished Lonavala, India. Why did I get started with this group? Helping people rebuild their lives after a natural disaster, or simply build a life after being born to disadvantage, just feels good inside.
Too many people think they have to be wealthy to make a difference.
When I first began to explore the transition from a focus on personal gain and career success to a focus on becoming significant-the kind of person who does good things for others and lifts them up in some way-I encountered plenty of resistance. Isn't that something you do after you've worked forty years and provided for your family and have saved enough money to give it away or can afford to quit work for pay and become a volunteer?
A good friend of mine, Jay Ogilvy, who has a Ph.D. and is a philosopher and author, and who has long given of himself in the nonprofit world, put it to me this way: "Ken, you know I'd like to make the reverse transition-from significance to success!" Jay may not be rich, but the idea that he isn't already a huge success is flat-out ridiculous. His success is measured in his happy family, high academic standing, and obvious sense of self-fulfillment. Through his work he's been lifting people up for most of his adult life. Lots of ordinary people are doing it too. Re-
Donna Rodgers, a runaway at age fourteen, fought her way through college and while still a young woman launched a nonprofit in Milwaukee,
Wisconsin, that teaches urban youth basic business skills. Paige Ellison in Anniston, Alabama, took $20,000 from the sale of her home to start a nonprofit that builds temporary but secure playgrounds and day care centers at disaster sites so that "kids could go about the business of being kids" while their parents got back on their feet.
Let's dispense right away with any thought that only the rich make a difference. Sure, it's easy for Bill Gates with his extraordinary wealth to write a check to the University of Manitoba to start an AIDS prevention program in India. But it's just as easy for folks with ordinary income to read to a child at school one hour a week. And here's the thing-it's just as potent, when we act en masse. "Let's not just praise billionaires,"
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