Wednesday, November 16, 2011

Elegant Respect & Citizenship In Atlanta Hartsfield



A wonderfully moving moment just happened in just the right way and at just the right time in the middle of the bustle and blindness in Atlanta's Hartsfield airport, one of the busiest on the planet.  As my wife was in the middle of it a group of maybe 150 military men and women approached and as Rena explained it everyone was completely tuned in to their own little worlds found in our handhelds and the "social comfort for 1" better known as our favorite coffee drink from Starbucks or some imposter.  What happened next was absolutely astonishing and filled everyone there's heart in the most unexpected and spontaneous of ways. The dynamic energy and commitment to this great nation of ours was felt with a palpability to the point that everyone immediately stopped what they were doing looked up and applauded with an intensity and unity that's rare to experience outside of a concert or sporting event and neither of those carries even close to the same gravity of what was unfolding in the airport monday.  This is what it's all about to me when we speak and think of what respect and citizenship are and the immeasurable value they carry in bonding us all together as Americans.

There's a constant theme that keeps revealing itself to me in recent days and weeks that the way to truly live life to the highest potential of our God-given gifts and happiness and to the happiness of those we touch is to keep ourselves shining in gratitude, giving to others we can assist with in finding their success and generating an uplifting positive energy that becomes an affliction everyone's after.  This is the way I've come to see with a crystalizing clarity.  This is an engine from which respect and citizenship rule the road with a speed and precision that's unsurpassable.  With it we move our days, our homes, our towns, our cities, our states and our very nation with coordination, synchronicity and success.  Without it we gum up the works, everything's a task, little really gets done and discord is the uneasy result leaving harmony and meaning in the dust.

Yes, it's that big, in fact it's vital to our very future well-being that we all play our part in living respect and citizenship.  Do it in your own way yet let others see and by all means let others receive all the good inside you.  Who is the last person you said thank you to?  Ever wonder what it's like to make a perfect stranger's day perfect?  Live your own "Hartsfield moment," after all what do we all have to gain from you?

gary c. rettinger

1 comment:

  1. WOW, I can feel the love of this moment myself. I believe we are all more connected than we realize. The work of Character Counts! continues to teach me that we are at our very essence the same.

    As we share moments like this, we open each other to keeping our eyes and hearts open to experiencing them too!!

    Thanks for this beautiful view of life!!

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