People have a unique tool for managing their lives, says the author of this article, Svetlana Mikhailova.
“We were returning home along the Leningradskoe highway. Evening was approaching. My daughter and husband took me home from work in their car. The conversation did not go well: this time the traffic jam on Leningradka was more than usual, and we all looked at the road with tension. And something terrible was going on there. Trying to get out of the traffic jam, the cars literally climbed on top of each other. Particularly impatient ones burst out onto the sidewalk, forcing passers-by to scatter to the sides. But the sidewalk has its own traffic jam.
The situation was aggravated by poor visibility. Winter was on the doorstep, so it quickly got dark, a harsh wind blew interspersed with snow, striving now and then to close up the car window. I had to maneuver among the cars almost blindly. All this made me very nervous. Moreover, a baby and a nanny were already waiting for my children at home. The nanny was of German blood, "ordnung", order was above all for her, and the slightest violation of it she perceived as a personal insult, so that if she was late, she could easily kick up and leave. Naturally, all this did not add much joy …
Suddenly, something loomed in front of the car. The son-in-law braked sharply. The car jerked, and a peasant appeared in front of us - not even blue, but all white from the cold. Barely moving his frozen lips, he began to explain that his car was stuck in a traffic jam and that we could not take him to Petrozavodskaya Street with the help of a tug.
Our house was located on the Leningradskoe highway, that is, it was necessary to go to it in a straight line. And on Petrozavodskaya you would have to turn aside, and even make your way there along narrow streets, probably also packed with cars, and then try to get out of there back in the same crush.
But the son-in-law, without saying a word, reached into the trunk for the cable.
- What are you guys! - I was worried. - And what about the nanny? After all, she will give birth there out of impatience.
- But we can't leave a man on the street! - my daughter objected. “Besides, we made a vow.
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And the daughter told how one day, being with her husband on a long trip, they suddenly got stuck in a deserted place - the engine suddenly failed. They did not know what to do next, if not for an accidental stranger, who patiently drove their car in tow for tens of kilometers to Moscow, without taking a dime from them. And since then, my daughter and her husband have vowed to always help those who are in distress on the road.
So this little man, though with great difficulty, was finally delivered to Petrozavodskaya. Having thawed out on the move in his car, he happily told us that, it turns out, he has been voting on the road for the second day. The day before, no one agreed to help him, the drivers indifferently drove by, and the peasant was forced to leave his car by the side of the road and go home on foot.
“But my soul ached unbearably for the“wet nurse”, abandoned alone in the traffic,” a peasant who worked as a driver admitted to us. And there was no money for a tow truck. And in the morning the next day the peasant again went to vote. After standing unsuccessfully all day, I froze terribly and I was about to leave again, if not for us …
We returned home surprisingly quickly: the traffic jam had already resolved by that time, and the streets became empty and empty. The nanny greeted us unexpectedly friendly: as it turned out, she and the baby were watching an interesting animated series and during this activity they did not even notice how time flew by. For some reason, at dinner we were also lively and joyful, telling jokes, laughing merrily, joking. In general, the mood was somehow good and light …
All this led me to the following reflections.
We do not often think about what is good and evil. For us, these are already such ordinary concepts that we sometimes refer them to abstract, philosophical categories, while these concepts are able to live completely independently and even generate something similar to themselves.
Once, walking around GUM, I suddenly discovered that I had lost my wallet. There was a fairly large amount of money in the wallet. So I immediately went in search. I went around all the departments of GUM, even visited the administrator. But the wallet disappeared without a trace. Completely upset, I went home. But at home I was greeted with unexpected news:
- Have you lost your money at GUM? Mom asked. - Some people have already called here and found this money. And they learned your phone from the business card that was in the wallet.
The callers (they also walked around GUM on the same day and found my wallet in one of the departments on the floor) turned out to be an ordinary Moscow family. Its head worked in the district police, his wife was a housewife, there were two more boys of school age. All four of them lived in a one-room apartment, very modestly. With money from my wallet, they could furnish their apartment nicely. But they gave me every penny. “We will never take someone else's,” said the mother. And there was so much inner, restrained dignity in her voice that it struck me to the very depths of my soul.
A few months later, my youngest daughter, returning home, exclaimed from the doorway:
- Look what I have!
In her hands she had a super-sophisticated expensive mobile phone, shining with multicolored buttons. My daughter told how, at the bus stop, she saw a man who was running after the trolleybus and dropped his mobile phone from the back pocket of his trousers. Picking up her mobile phone, the daughter rushed after the man. But he had already left on a trolleybus. And now my daughter asked:
- Maybe take it yourself? What has fallen is lost!
It was tempting, of course, to keep the phone, which, it seemed to me, cost at least a thousand dollars. I involuntarily thought: a person who bought such an expensive toy can afford to buy another one exactly the same.
“No,” I said to my daughter. - Let's return to the owner.
The owner only called his cell phone in the evening. Apparently, only then caught himself. And, apparently, he did not believe at all that he would be returned. We met him at the same trolleybus stop. We gave away the cell phone. Hearing how the man warmly thanks, says that we have returned his faith in human decency, my daughter told me:
- You know, you were right!
And I thought: after all, in our life there is one law that has not yet been indicated anywhere - no, not conservation, but adding energy. It could be formulated as follows: if something happened somewhere, it will not only necessarily give rise to something like that, but, having caused a chain reaction, will multiply further. That is, if a good is done somewhere by someone's will and reason, then it will certainly cause another good, another - a third, and so on, growing all the time.
And, on the contrary, evil can only give rise to evil, also multiplying in time. As Chesterton said: "You can't stay on the same level of evil - this path leads only downhill."
So, when we complain about our life today, about the fact that a lot of bad things have appeared in it, maybe it is worth thinking: is there also our own participation in this? I foresee someone's indignation: what have we got to do with it? But in all honesty, we honestly admit at least to ourselves: how long have we done good to our neighbors, relatives, acquaintances and strangers? How long have you helped each other from a pure heart? And did you not remain indifferent to those who needed to lend a helping hand? So, maybe, remembering the law of adding energy, and trying to do something good ourselves, so that a stream of good energy would arise from each of us? And then all these streams, gradually merging into a wide mighty river, could wash away all the bad things accumulated around us.
My father - may his memory be bright! - taught at the university for many years. He was a very honest and decent person. Maybe that's why he didn't make much good. But he left us, his children, that which is dearer than anything else - his good name.
Somehow, years later, when my father was no longer alive, together with a group of journalists I had a chance to visit the same region. We were received by his leader - a rather famous person in the country. At the table, they started talking, and the leader mentioned that he had graduated from the Faculty of History at one time.
-And our Svetlana's father taught at the history department. - immediately said one of the journalists.
Hearing my father's name, the leader suddenly rose from the table.
- Let me kneel before you! After all, your father saved my life …
He really wanted to kneel down in front of me, which made me quite embarrassed. As it turned out, at a time when the leader was just a poor student, he was in a critical situation: his last money was stolen. There was nothing to pay for the apartment, nothing to buy food. The student, completely desperate, was already about to commit suicide. But his teacher unexpectedly helped him out, my father, who gave money to the student, helped him find another apartment. And so my father, as it turned out, helped many of his other students, who sincerely, wholeheartedly loved him. We, his children, felt this love for many years later, when we - quite unexpectedly for us - also received support in memory of our father.
So here the law of energy gain was at play.
One involuntarily thinks: Heaven, it turns out, provided people with such a seemingly completely simple and at the same time brilliant tool for managing their own lives, like good and evil. After all, as we have already said, having arisen once, they not only do not disappear in time and space, but, on the contrary, generate a similar thing to themselves, transforming simultaneously through positive or negative energy - in one direction or another - the existence of our society.
So it turns out that, in fact, it depends on each of us what energy in this world will become more and in which direction the scale of our life will swing. In mathematics, after all, in operations with positive and negative numbers, as a result, the larger number in numerical expression always takes over.
This rule applies even when, in violation of the law, good can be answered with evil, and vice versa. Here, too, everything depends on the degree of energy released.
For example, if one of the parties presents more positive energy, then this energy will simply remove the evil directed in its direction, even if there is less of it. However, even in a reduced form, it will continue to operate further - you never know stories about completely lost people who, under the influence of a sincere and kind attitude towards them, changed for the better.