The Value of Now

In The Great Debaters, the preacher character played by Forest Whitaker repeatedly says to his 14-year-old son, "We do what we have to do in order to do what we want to do."

I find this to be one of the hardest but yet most valuable lessons in life.


When you look around, everything in life is established in this order. We study to gain knowledge, so that we can apply that knowledge to life. We save our hard earned money, so that we can enjoy the retirement in the future. We put great effort into building strong relationships now, so that when the rainy season comes, we will have a solid ground to stand on in order to endure and overcome the challenges.


It is hard enough for grown adults to see and practice this; I can only imagine how vague this idea must be in a child's still developing mind. All I can hope for is that all the mundane hard work and seemingly insignificant principles we work on today will one day contribute to the formation of stronger and more stable roots in our childrens' lives.