By: Kojo Yankson
Credit: Myjoyonline.com
Howard Kelly is considered to be the father of
gynecology. He is also one of the "Big Four" professors who founded
the Johns Hopkins Hospital in Baltimore, Maryland. Howard wasn't always a
renowned physician though - once upon a time, he was a struggling student who
had to travel to different towns, selling goods door to door, just to pay his
fees.
There
was a day when he was starving and couldn't afford a meal. He decided to ask
for something to eat at the next house he visited, otherwise he was pretty sure
he would pass out on the sidewalk before long. The next door he knocked on was
answered by a beautiful girl, and Howard momentarily lost his nerve. Instead of
begging for food, he simply asked for a glass of water.
The
girl could see that the poor guy needed more than water, but she didn't have
any food, so she gave him a glass of milk instead. Howard gulped it down and
immediately felt better, but he still felt a need to maintain some pride.
"How
much do I owe you?", he asked the girl.
She
smiled and said, "My mother taught me never to take payment for kindness,
so you owe me nothing".
Many
years later, Howard was a renowned gynecologist, healing women of all manner of
seemingly untreatable illnesses and charging hefty fees for his much needed
services.
One
day, a woman was brought to him. Local doctors had tried and failed to treat
her, and had sent her to the big city for specialists to "study her
condition" while she waited to die. His colleagues took one look at the
lady and declared that she would be "dead by midnight", but Howard
Kelly had other ideas. He worked tirelessly to cure the poor lady, and after a
month, sent her home fit and well.
After
some time, the lady received her bill from the hospital. She trembled as she
opened the envelope, knowing there was no way she could pay her bill without
selling all her assets and borrowing some money too. To her surprise, the
invoice had one sentence written on it:
"Paid
in full with a glass of milk".
My
people, we talk a lot about altruism, but the truth is that kindness is often
an investment. Investments that can pay you back twice. First, it rewards you
with a nice warm feeling at the moment you perform a kind act, and then
sometimes, it comes back to reward you again at a future date, when you are
most in need of kindness yourself.
Every
time I get to the tollbooth on the Tema motorway, I pay my own toll, as well as
that of the car behind mine. I do this because once upon a time, someone did
this for me. I appreciated it so much that I am on a lifelong crusade to keep
doing this every time I use the motorway, in the hope that one-day, the car
behind me will belong to the kind stranger who once paid my toll. I only pray
that on that day, he or she will also have no change on her, like I did on the
day they paid for me.
My
friends, if you want to feel good today, then do something kind for a stranger.
Pick someone you have never met, and make them remember this day forever. It
doesn't even have to involve money. Just writing, "you are an amazing
person" on a post-it note and sticking it on a random car's windscreen,
will put a smile on a stranger's face for the whole day.
But
if you want to feel good for the rest of your life, then beginning today, treat
everyone you meet as if they were going to be dead by midnight. Extend to them
all the care, kindness and understanding you can muster, and do it with no
thought of any reward. Your life will never be the same again.
My
name is Kojo Yankson, and the surest investment I can recommend is a random act
of kindness. Expect no reward, and you're bound to get one.
GOOD
MORNING, GHANAFO!
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