How can I Seek the Good of Others? Some Practical Ways

Service, Capability Building, Social Enterprise, Advocacy, Activism, Community Organizing - just a few ways of seeking the good of others.

“Only a life lived for others is worthwhile”

- Albert Einstein

“Life’s most persistent and urgent question is, ‘What are you doing for others?’”

- Martin Luther King, Jr.

We can’t all think of a formula that explains all of physics (like Einstein tried to do), and we can’t all die fighting for civil rights (like Martin Luther King, Jr). But whoever we are, whatever we have, wherever we find ourselves, there are always opportunities to seek the good of others. We just have to find the way that fits our passion and resources.

One way is to serve - to perform an action of provide a good that helps make lives better for another person. Such as helping an elderly person with his daily tasks, giving food to those who are hungry, or helping to build somebody’s home, etc. These actions are purely voluntary, might require some sacrifice on our part, and may not even change the problem - but it could provide some relief for those who are suffering.

You’ve heard the adage about how, if you give a person a fish, you feed him for a day. But if you teach him to fish, he gets to feed himself for a lifetime. Training or “capacity building” is a form of service that seeks to enable somebody else to do what he needs to do.

Another way of seeking the good of others is to find ways to make the goods or services they need more affordable or accessible. It may be necessary to charge a reasonable fee to sustain or scale this effort. This is called by some “social entrepreneurship” or simply entrepreneurship.

Sometimes the people we want to help can’t effectively speak for themselves. In that case, we can serve as their advocates. We can help them clarify what they want to say, choose an appropriate medium, deliver the message, then measure the impact - and do it all over again until they get what they need.

These days, “activism” sounds like something only a “radical” would do. But activism simply means a philosophy or action designed to convince authorities to make changes. This may take the form, among others, of petition-signing, or participating in a march or in a rally.  The ideas behind activism is that “my action is going to make a difference’; the idea behind mass actions is that “if people show up, change occurs”.

Still another approach is community organizing - getting to know people in a community, discerning what troubles them, and helping them to seek what they need for themselves and in their own terms. The idea here is that the community can learn to become more confident in their ability to seek their own good.

All of these possible ways of seeking the good of others should be anchored on love for people, in the context of love for God. Without love, these actions can degenerate into “praise releases” for those deliver the service, instead of shining a light on the suffering of our brothers and sisters. Without love, efforts to improve society can result in violent change that brings about worse conditions than the ones they were supposed to address.

But with love, any effort, no matter how small, can make a positive effect on the lives of those who are helped - and those who help.

Given your interests, talent, time, and other resources, which way of seeking the good of others works for you?