Leading fashion

Believe in What You Believe

March 19th, 2010 -- Posted in life | No Comments »

Last week was hard for me. When I came back from a one-month business trip, I found my partner left, taking away all the money from the company we ran together. We once had been best friend, since we were small boys. We trusted each other so many years. However, he betrayed me, owing to the money. I have nothing now, which means I went back to the starting point. What’s worse, I began to doubt true meaning of life. I thought friendship was a lie, and any emotion would collapse, facing the personal profits.

I didn’t know how I went back home. Sitting on the bed, I thought a lot. Suddenly I saw the shell on the table beside my bed. At the sight of it, my memory went back to the past.

Nine years ago around the New Year, I was on an island beach at sunrise. I crouched low there ad immersed myself in the false of hope of finding a treasure larger than the small shell on the shore.

A man jogged along the waves in my direction. When he came near me, he slowed to walk. I didn’t notice him until he was almost standing over me. Too young to be shy of strangers, I got on my feet and looked at him. It was then that I saw what was in his hand, a beautiful bright cream-colored shell, the kind of thing that I was looking for. He smiled as I stared in surprise, and then, to my shock, he handed it to me. I held it carefully before me like a diamond, not believing my own eyes.

“I think you will like it,” he said, and then continued his run down the beach.

I do not remember his voice, his clothes or even his face, but I still have the shell. Now the shell sits on my table, not as bright and big as it was, but it is still there, a quiet reminder that there is kindness in the world.

The man saved my belief in the kindness of people, and he saved my belief that one can find what means something in life. I see my shell everyday. And I know that I can get through bad days because there are good things in my life. In the end, all that we have is what we have done for others. The shell is important to me, as important as another man who returned to the plane to give me my lost jacket.

I know that making a difference in someone’s life, no matter how big or small, is what truly matters, and that it is worth all the treasure in the world.

It occurred to me that the world was very beautiful, and the second morning’s sunshine would penetrate the window to come to the room. I cheered up. I decided to be myself again, even though my starting line was zero. I was convinced that I could be something in the future.