Oxygen Mask

I'd like to share with you a moment I had while talking to someone online just a few days ago. I was talking to a young woman over in Canada who had a really amazing human story. But it wasn't her story that I wanted to share with you quite so much as the thoughts it led me to afterwards.

This young womans story started some years back, I think she was eighteen at the time. Her family had an accident and she had lost both her parents and one of her siblings. Herself and her younger brother were all that were left of the family to carry on. She is now twenty one and the little brother is twelve. With the departure of those members, the responsibility for looking after the young boy fell on her shoulders.

She told me that she was working very hard, I believe she said she was waitressing and she was putting every spare dollar she could find into supporting her younger brother. Putting it away so that he would have the opportunity to get a good University education and hopefully be able to turn that into a good paying job.

I felt so lucky to hear her story and felt that she was a really honorable and noble girl. But it led me to thinking about something which was once said to me, and I would like now to share that with you. Please understand I have no intention to degrade what amazing things this young woman is doing. But I feel this is important information for us all to consider.

If you have ever been on an aircraft, and I have certainly been on more than my fair share, you will know that before the plane leaves the ground, the flight attendants are required to give a demonstration of the aircraft safety features and procedures. During this demonstration they will tell you that in the event of an emergency, such as an on-board fire, Oxygen masks will fall from the ceiling of the plane for you to put on. What is important here is that every time, on every aircraft, on every airline, in every language, they always say the same thing about putting on the oxygen masks. You must put your own mask on before assisting your child, or any other person, to put on theirs. They say that every time without fail. And there is a very good reason for it.

It's because if you try to do it the other way around, and the plane has lost cabin pressure, or is filled with smoke, or both, if you try to tend to the other person first and you can't breathe, you're not helping anyone! Because you're already well on your way to dead.

In that sort of a situation, the only way you can help someone is if you help yourself first.

Now this young woman told me that they were doing ok. they had food on the table and a roof and the boy was in school. And I know what a challenge just that can be. But I could tell in her voice and the way she was telling her story that she was starting to flag. Already, at twenty one, thrust into motherhood due to a terrible accident, she was feeling the pressure. But she was determined to sacrifice her own success to make sure this boy was going to have a good opportunity.

But that worries me. Because at this point in time in both of there lives, she is the stronger and more able of the two. She is the one who has the opportunity to do something that will pull them both out of difficult times, not just the boy.

Consider two mountain climbers. These two mountain climbers go to climb a mountain and at one point they reach a 50m vertical cliff. One of the climbers is very good at climbing vertical cliffs and the other has never done it before. Should that climber, who has climbed so many cliffs before, go first, or should they stay at the bottom and try to push the other one up? How far can any of us push someone else up a cliff. Have you ever tried? And what about the climber who has never climbed a cliff before in their lives. Aren't they going to be just a little bit scared? I would think the new comer would want to find any way possible to get out of climbing that cliff.

Is it not better to have the experienced climber go first, to show the other how it's done? To show them where to put their hands and feet and how to use their body and move their weight just right? To show them the way up? Is it not better to have that person to climb up with a rope, and then drop it down so the climber who has never climbed a cliff before in their life can then feel not only that they now know how to do it, but that they also have a safety rope? And will it not be so much easier for the experienced climber, using a secure tree they find at the top of the cliff, to slowly but surely pull the new comer to the top.

I know sometimes it seems noble to sacrifice yourself so that others may benefit. And I know that sometimes, there simply is no other way. But this young woman of twenty one, lives in a world full of opportunity. And her little brother is watching his big sister very carefully. He has to, she's the only one he has left. Everyone else is gone. What will he learn by seeing his big sister remain small.

We can't push someone up a fifty meter cliff who doesn't know how to climb. And if we don't know how to climb either then all we need to do is find someone who can, and ask them to show us how so that we can teach someone else.

When you find yourself in a world that's going down, and the only hope you have is to take that oxygen mask, please please, put it on yourself first. The oxygen in there is pure, it will give you more energy than any air you have ever breathed before in your life. Then you can help your child or your struggling friend. They won't fend for themselves if you can't teach them how.