Following up on the Point of Choice, which is the time in your life when you can forsake traditional work to go and do what what you love while serving others and exercising your signature strengths, I'd like to give you some more in-depth examples of some people who have come to that point of choice. Two such examples are Geoff Tabin and Mansoor Emam.
Geoff Tabin, along with his partner, Dr. Sanduk Ruit, both opthamologists, founded the Himalayan Cataract Project to eliminate as much unneccesary blindness as possible during their lives. They perform cataracts surgery on people in normally unreachable places in the Himalayas, where there are no proper care facilities, clean drinking water or electricity. Knowing that cataracts are a preventable and curable cause of blindness, they set out to treat as many instances of the illness as possible. To date, they have used their skills to help train over 100 doctors in their low-cost, high-efficiency procedures, along with over 100 nurses and assistants. Also, mor importantly, they have screened 200,000+ people and treated 12,000-15,000 people on a yearly basis since 1994. Initially, they had some hurdles to overcome, mainly the high cost of replacement lenses. Upon discovering the extreme profits earned by the manufacturers of these lenses relative to the costs, Dr. Ruit managed to lower the costs significantly in order to make his work reach farther by providing lower-cost treatment to his patients. In this example, you can see that helping others requires no special skill set. Dr.'s Ruit and Tabin have merely adapted their normal jobs by working for free to benefit many more people than they could have in any hospital or clinic. Well, almost any...
Dr. Mansoor Emam is an Iranian immigrant who studied at the University of Utah (boo!) under a scholarship, and later worked at the Intermountain Health Center in Salt Lake City. After Working in the emergency room for some time, and recalling his extreme poverty and lack of proper medical care in Iran, Dr. Emam decided to help those in the local community who lacked medical insurance but were too poor to qualify for federal assistance. After auspiciously partnering with some benefactors, Dr. Emam started the Maliheh Free Clinic in Salt Lake City. Through this, he helps people with a variety of illnesses for low or no cost, thanks to donations and donated surpluses from hospitals and pharmacies. His quest is based off of a belief that all Americans deserve basic health care. Dr. Emam came to Craig's class yesterday and introduced his clinic and the ideas behind it. I really liked his presentation due to his passion for the clinic and the people it helps. This clinic runs totally off of charity; donated medicine, volunteer work, including Craig, and other numerous monetary donations.
As a reprise from my previous article, I know there are people all around us who give freely of their time and means to help those around them. Many use special talents and skills in unique ways to serve. However, most have no other unique characteristic than a willing and loving heart. I would encourage you to give what you can, when you can. It is of course great to help, but no-one can give from empty shelves. Even in the limited manner that this blog is a form of service, I feel really passionate about this subject and I really enjoy writing about these topics.
Links: cureblindness.org, Malihah Free Clinic
Geoff Tabin, along with his partner, Dr. Sanduk Ruit, both opthamologists, founded the Himalayan Cataract Project to eliminate as much unneccesary blindness as possible during their lives. They perform cataracts surgery on people in normally unreachable places in the Himalayas, where there are no proper care facilities, clean drinking water or electricity. Knowing that cataracts are a preventable and curable cause of blindness, they set out to treat as many instances of the illness as possible. To date, they have used their skills to help train over 100 doctors in their low-cost, high-efficiency procedures, along with over 100 nurses and assistants. Also, mor importantly, they have screened 200,000+ people and treated 12,000-15,000 people on a yearly basis since 1994. Initially, they had some hurdles to overcome, mainly the high cost of replacement lenses. Upon discovering the extreme profits earned by the manufacturers of these lenses relative to the costs, Dr. Ruit managed to lower the costs significantly in order to make his work reach farther by providing lower-cost treatment to his patients. In this example, you can see that helping others requires no special skill set. Dr.'s Ruit and Tabin have merely adapted their normal jobs by working for free to benefit many more people than they could have in any hospital or clinic. Well, almost any...
Dr. Mansoor Emam is an Iranian immigrant who studied at the University of Utah (boo!) under a scholarship, and later worked at the Intermountain Health Center in Salt Lake City. After Working in the emergency room for some time, and recalling his extreme poverty and lack of proper medical care in Iran, Dr. Emam decided to help those in the local community who lacked medical insurance but were too poor to qualify for federal assistance. After auspiciously partnering with some benefactors, Dr. Emam started the Maliheh Free Clinic in Salt Lake City. Through this, he helps people with a variety of illnesses for low or no cost, thanks to donations and donated surpluses from hospitals and pharmacies. His quest is based off of a belief that all Americans deserve basic health care. Dr. Emam came to Craig's class yesterday and introduced his clinic and the ideas behind it. I really liked his presentation due to his passion for the clinic and the people it helps. This clinic runs totally off of charity; donated medicine, volunteer work, including Craig, and other numerous monetary donations.
As a reprise from my previous article, I know there are people all around us who give freely of their time and means to help those around them. Many use special talents and skills in unique ways to serve. However, most have no other unique characteristic than a willing and loving heart. I would encourage you to give what you can, when you can. It is of course great to help, but no-one can give from empty shelves. Even in the limited manner that this blog is a form of service, I feel really passionate about this subject and I really enjoy writing about these topics.
Links: cureblindness.org, Malihah Free Clinic
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