I recently saw a vid that was called “The Power of Words”. It began by showing a grizzled old blind man sitting on a sidewalk on a busy city street with lots of pedestrians walking by. In front of him was a tin can with a few coins in it, and beside him was a cut-up cardboard sign which read, “I’m blind. Please help.”

Some people stopped to drop a few coins in the can, but most simply looked then looked away as they walked by or pretended to ignore him. It went on like this for quite some time, until a woman walked up to him. She picked up his sign and started writing on it’s reverse side and placed it back where it had been but with her writing facing the people walking by. The man reached out and felt her shoes. She left a moment later without either having said a word.

All of a sudden, many more people stopped to put money into the can, and the amounts being put into it appeared to be larger per donation. This too went on for some time.

Awhile later the woman who had changed the sign walked by and stopped to see how it was going. The man felt the shape of her shoes and knew it was the same woman. He asked her what she had written that had worked so well and she replied, “I just said the same thing in a different way”. Then she walked away.

At the end of the vid the camera zoomed in on the words she had written:

“It’s a beautiful day and I can’t see it.”

While the the vid was titled “The Power of Words”, I like to believe that it was really about the power of love. The love of the woman who changed the sign and the love of all the people who gave so generously when they were able to see the situation from a more personal perspective.