In this episode, I shift gears to discuss something close to my heart: making service to others a habit, especially in times of crisis. The recent devastation caused by Hurricane Helene has highlighted the necessity of compassion, empathy, and resilience within our communities.

Key Teaching Points and Takeaways:

1. Develop Empathy and Compassion:

- Serving others helps us develop empathy and compassion. It allows us to attempt to put ourselves in others' shoes and understand their struggles and challenges.

2. Gain Perspective:

- Helping others provides valuable perspective on our own lives and challenges. It helps us distinguish between real challenges and mere inconveniences.

3. Build Stronger Communities:

Acts of service contribute to more robust, resilient relationships, families, and communities. Whether you lend your time, attention, or resources, these acts can greatly impact and improve collective well-being.

4. Personal Fulfillment:

- True personal fulfillment comes from giving rather than receiving. Serving others fills us with joy and happiness that can sustain us through life's ups and downs.

5. Start Small:

- Begin incorporating small acts of kindness into your daily routine. Whether helping a neighbor with their yard or picking up groceries for someone in need, these little actions can significantly impact them.

6. Reflect on Gratitude:

- Appreciate what you have and look for ways to give back to others. Focus on gratitude and recognize the privilege of having your needs met.

7. Develop Empathy:

- Work on understanding other people's perspectives and challenges. Compare down rather than up to understand what others might be going through.

8. Stay Connected and Informed:

- Remain aware of the needs within your community and the world at large. Stay informed and find ways to get involved and help.

9. Make Service a Habit:

- Create habits around serving others that you commit to not breaking. Volunteer your time and resources regularly in areas that matter to you and align with your passions.

Call to Action:

Lastly, remember the significance of service: you'll never look into the eyes of another human being who does not matter to God. Serve with a heart full of generosity and compassion without looking for recognition. Let's work towards becoming a community that overflows with love and support for one another.

Connect with Tim:

Instagram: [@timpecoraro](https://www.instagram.com/timpecoraro)

Welcome to Blank Pages, the podcast. A podcast for people who appreciate the new beginnings of a clean slate, but strive for the courage, willingness, curiosity, and creativity available only on the blank pages of new possibilities. It's the potential to move beyond and move forward where people are willing to make new decisions from fresh perspectives and are ready to write in a much better way. So the world is waiting, and nothing listens better than a blank piece of paper. So hello, my friends, and welcome to the show. I'm so glad that you can join me today. I don't know where you are in the world, but Mandy, a lot has been going on. There's stuff going on all over the world.

We've got, I mean, obviously we know there's trouble in the Middle east, trouble in the Ukraine and Russia. And then where I am, man, we just got hit with Hurricane Helene, which is an incredible storm. And never thought being in South Carolina, where I am, and in the upstate, that we would see anything like that, it's crazy. I was telling my daughter that. Isn't it interesting that you have experienced Covid-19 in your lifetime? You know, she's a teenager in high school, and. And you also witnessed and lived. You see this major storm that has impacted so many people's lives. So just want to be thoughtful for those folks.

And today's topic is kind of. I just shifted gears and I wanted to get into just something that's prompting me because of what we're experiencing. And just my heart's going out to so many people, going through so much, and it even, even touched people in my life. So. And I'm not going to focus on my world in my life. I'm going to focus on other people. So hopefully you are safe and you are okay and your loved ones are. But our thoughts and prayers are going out to those who are impacted by this, this very, very impactful, tragic storm that is producing a lot of disappointment, loss and problems.

So if you're listening to the show, I hope that you will subscribe to the show. Like the show, you can listen on Spotify. Wherever you're listening to any podcast, you can find the show. It's simple. Bl space, like empty nk and then pages p space n or p space, g e s. So that's just blank pages. You drop the letter a in both words and you will quickly find the podcast. And so I appreciate all of you who are listening and following.

It's simple to do. So if you're in Spotify podcast, just follow the show and it's real simple. And you will be notified every time I put on a new episode. So also, if you would follow me on Instagram pecoraro, you can find another way to connect with me, and that is through the newsletter. And I will put that out, or I put that out monthly. Also updating you on things that I'm doing, new things that I'm releasing into the community and out into the world. And hopefully it will be useful for you and we'll have shelf life for you to be able to bring into your world and apply it. And hopefully through getting knowledge, you will get understanding and wisdom.

Loves to work with a tool, and that tool is called understanding. So that's what I like to do, is provide things that are useful and can give you the understanding necessary for you to level up in your life. I have in my hand and I'm holding it. This is my show and tell today. It is a little tiny turtle. And I just called my daughter to verify, and I said, do you remember what this is? And she just smiled and she said, yes, this is a little itty bitty turtle that she gave to me. And I keep it right in front. So behind me, over my shoulder, back in there, you can see there are things hanging on the wall, guitars on the wall, my little bobbleheads that I shared as a show and tell.

But my desk is sitting right over here and in front of my desk, this has stayed with me. So everywhere I've moved to, this little turtle has come with me, and I need to name him. I know there's a book called Timmy Turtle, and I don't like that because when I was a kid, I didn't like being called Timmy. There's only one person I allowed calling me Timmy besides my mom was my little brother, and he can call me Timmy, and that was fine. But other than that, it's Tim or Timothy. Those are the names. But this is my little turtle. And it means something to me because she gave it to me.

She just said, here, papa. And I remember she got it. I think she bought it with one of her schools, that she was at an elementary in one of those little stores, little school stores. And she got me this little turtle. And I have loved this little guy ever since. And so that is my show and tell today. And this little turtle goes with me wherever I'm going to do my work and whatever. My desk is my main location, this little turtle is there.

So today's topic, you know, looking at what is going on in the world, I wanted to just put a highlight an emphasis on serving people and service. And the reason I'm saying that is because I'm looking at, I'm just going to say hurricane Helene. You know, I'm just going to give you some details for those who, you know, it's in the news, obviously, but it was a category for, it made landfall in Florida and it caused, you know, devastation through multiple states. But here's the storm's impact. Right. This is how it's been severe. At least 125 lives have been lost across several states. Over 1.5 million people are without power.

I know that's coming down as they're working on it. Entire neighborhoods in western North Carolina are completely submerged. There are camps like Bon Clark in that are wiped out. Chimney Rock Lake lore. These places that are just beautiful places. They're just, I mean, they're gone. And then Asheville, everybody talks about Asheville. Asheville, because it is a, it's a destination place.

But that's not even. There's so many things around Asheville that are literally impacted unbelievably by this storm. The critical infrastructure, including roads, bridges, they've just been damaged. They're having to rebuild complete networks, complete power grids. It is, it's been rough and there's an urgent need for people to come together. And so based on those stats, I just, it just made me think, now I'm a person, I'm service minded regardless. So I've always been service minded. I like to serve.

I give a lot. I give a lot of my time. I give resources. I give not just my time, I'll give money, I'll give possessions, things that I have. And that's because when you've been blessed and you have things in your life, blessing is not so much. It's everything is abundance to me. When you have your needs met, you are blessed. If I have a sandwich and if I know someone else is hungry, I will cut that in half and share with somebody.

If there are three people, then I'll cut it in. I'll cut it in quarters and each of us can have, you know, there are three other people beside me. Each of us can have a quarter of it. Like, I believe in doing things that way. I don't believe in going, well, it's my sandwich and I'll see how much I'll give. I'm not gonna cut it in half and say, now you guys cut the other half in thirds. That's just me. It's just how I'm wired.

Also, when it comes to just being extravagant in giving not just out of abundance. It's not just when you have so much and you're plenty. It drives me nuts when I see multimillionaires make a big deal out of giving $600, like, oh, I gave something like, wow, big deal. Now that may be a lot for them. I don't know. But I just, sometimes I wonder what we feel is extravagant. It's imagining that. It's amazing to me that you have people that can have these real elaborate, extravagant lifestyles, but they really struggle over the basic giving principles just to give, just generosity.

So I just, in times of crisis, right? And what I want to do is I want to get service as a habit and a practice. That's what this is about, that we would learn to make service and being in service of others a habit and practice. And so when you're serving others, it's not just about helping during disasters and crisis. Crisis. It's, to me, it's fundamental aspects of, I believe in your own personal growth and in societal well being. Cause here's what happens, and I'm just gonna share a few things. When you're serving others, these are the things that happen, right? When we serve others, we develop empathy and we develop compassion. So, you know, and I'm one of those people that I like to say, okay, you know what? What can we do to become more empathetic and more compassionate? What can we do to say, I'm not gone through what you've done, but I'm going to try to put myself in your shoes and compassion, saying, I know I've been there, and to some degree, and I can feel from there.

Right, so how do we develop both of those? Not just one. I know some people try to be more, they're trying to be more empathetic. I say develop both. Develop your compassion and your empathy. One is you put yourself in their shoes. The other one is you've been in their shoes or been somewhere like it. So develop both of them. When you get this opportunity to serve other people, you know, humanity, that true spirit of being, the people that say, there's never a time that you will look in the eyes of another human being that does not matter to God.

So it's fundamental to me. It's so important for personal growth and for our society. So when we are serving others, we can develop empathy and compassion. The other thing is we gain perspective on our own lives and challenges. So it helps us to see, like, where you really are. What does your life really look like? What are, what are your challenges? Get. Get a true perspective. Now, I know some people can.

You know, I mean, most of the things I hear, and trust me, what we're going through is. Has been bad, but there are people in the world that are going through far worse. And so a lot of times we're complaining about, I don't have power right now, and, man, I'd really like to have some microwave popcorn. You know, what a first world problem. You know, I look at. I look at, like, I'm seeing families in the neighborhood where their kids aren't holding up their devices and walking around. They're actually walking through the neighborhood. They're outside playing ball.

They're actually doing things like Covid. Covid was tragic, I think. But you know, what it did? It brought people together. It made people do some different things. But right now, with power being gone and all this other stuff, I feel like it's. It's getting people to maybe gain perspective on your own lives and challenges and what really are challenges and what are just inconveniences. And there's a difference between, is it a challenge or is it just an inconvenience? You know, we can get a better perspective. Also, what it does is it helps us to contribute to building stronger and more resilient.

And that's what I was saying. Walking with your family, kids, whatever, more resilient relationships, families and communities. See, all of those things are impacted by serving. When you get into this mindset of service and being available to other, serving other people could be you serve them with your time and your attention. That's being in service of someone, someone who is just starved for communication, someone who would love it if someone spoke with him. You know, we don't see leprosy in the world, but there were accounts in the time, and if you look at even in biblical, when you look at in the time when Jesus walked the earth or before, before Christ, you know, but there were times in, even in the world, there are still people that deal with, like, leprosy, and those people would not be touched or hugged or loved. They were pretty much, they were unclean, and people treated them that way. Similar.

We see people who are sicknesses or illnesses and things that we. It's like you don't want to get near them. Ooh, you're not like me. You're sick. You know, it's. Ugh, it's so rough. It's so. It's so scary to know that people need, they don't understand that there's a need out there where you can serve people with your time and your attention.

And through doing that, your relationships can improve, your family can improve, your marriage can improve, your significant other relationship can improve. I mean, whatever it is, your community can improve, your business can improve, your teamwork on your team can improve. So much can happen when you get into the mindset of service and not just being served. And that reward is a personal fulfillment to me. So you can grow in empathy and compassion. The second thing is you gain perspective on your own life and challenges. The third is you. You can contribute to building stronger and more resilient relationships, families, communities.

And then the fourth, you, you get true personal fulfillment. That's a reward to me, is you. We were created to love and be loved. I believe we were created to serve and be served. Like, it's part of it. It's a relationship of give and take. It's not give in order to take or it's not just to receive. It's better to give more than it is to receive.

There's greater reward in it, especially when you are a person holding a handful. So when you are in the service mindset and you recognize you're created to give, not just receive, you have this personal fulfillment. Your happy fills up and, and then your joy is, is maxim. And it's huge. It's maximum, it's, it's this incredible joy that can overflow. And so I was, you know, I have a really good way, and now I brought them together because I tell people that we chase too much trying to be happy. Happy. And I don't believe that.

I don't believe we're supposed to, I think we're supposed to have joy. But I needed to fix that because it's, it's happy is all joy. Sorry, is the combination or all you're happy? If you were to look at, like, pavement, if you were to look at like stones that are laid on the ground and it's going to become a walkway. When you grout all those stones together, they become foundationally strong. So it could be, this person did this with me. This person did this. This person. I was able to help here.

All of those happy moments come together. And when you grout or you cement them together, that foundation is what is joy, that is what's sustainable. Joy lasts. Happiness comes and goes. But happy is so important at a foundational level, so you can find greater fulfillment. So many of you are looking for a way to feel valuable. Here's how you do it. It's not in what people do for you, it's when you take your mind off yourself and stop serving yourself and serve someone else.

Stop serving yourself by thinking about yourself all the time and what yourself doesn't have and what you feel like you're missing. And I tell you what, you can see your life become better and change when you begin to help complete the things in other people's lives. Now you say, well, what if I don't have anything? My hands are empty. Listen, I have seen more happen with a person who has a willingness to give and then be able to do more than they've ever imagined than those who are waiting for just the right amount before they give. My thing is give now. Give with from what you have, but give with joy in your heart. Give like. Like, with.

With. I mean, like, be happy about it. Give ridiculously. Give extravagantly. Give. So, you know, I'm seeing folks that. I mean, I went to the grocery store, and I saw a guy pushing a shopping cart, and all these people are looking for ice, and he's got a buggy loaded up with ice, loaded up. And I look at this guy, and I was like, hey, how much are those bags each? He said, I don't know.

And then he goes, oh, I have six families. I mean, like, that's the answer. I've got six families. And there are people literally standing around looking at this guy with awe. All these ice bags, you know? And don't get me, I get it. Some of you are sitting there going, well, they should have got there sooner. Well, you know, everyone is trying to get there sooner. We don't know what tree they dodged or whatever else happened, but, you know, I'm glad this guy could find it, but we've lost that thing that says inside of us, hey, I've got some of these bags.

I still need to keep this many, but here, let me give you some. I mean, literally, it was loaded to the top with ice, and then the other buggy someone had with him was loaded up with other stuff, a bunch of the same stuff. Just wiping it out. The scarcity mentality. More for me. Well, here's the thing. You should have been doing that earlier. Make yourself an ice house and do all your prepping and storing, but don't come out when time hits and then say, I got here first, and because of it, I'll wipe everything out.

You know, like, show that you are. Listen, if you're that person who believes in getting more and making sure you have enough, then you would have been preparing for that sooner, just like everybody else who did prepare to whatever level they prepared, and it just, no matter how much you prepared, sometimes all your preparation is not enough. That's why it's important. When it comes down to the sandwich that you have, would you be willing to cut it in half? Would you be willing to cut it in thirds? Would you be willing to cut it in a quarter? I want to see people build a service oriented mindset. And so I'm just going to give you with these final thoughts here. In order to do that, to build it, I just want to give you some recommendations. Just start small. Incorporate simple acts of kindness into your daily routine.

Little things. Little things that serve. Like run to your neighbor's house and pick up the leaves in their yard before you finish yours. Help them if they're in your neighborhood and they're struggling, get to know them. Do something for them. Help a person who's, you know, stranded on the side of the road. And if it's not, you don't feel comfortable stopping. Yeah, but use wisdom.

If you're a little afraid, that doesn't make you, you know, some sort of racist or a bigot or whatever you are because you want. No. Then you just pick up the phone and you call roadside service for them and help. That's another way to do it. Okay, so I'm saying get rid of all the excuses and just start small, simple acts of kindness into your daily routine. The second is reflect on gratitude. You know, appreciate what you have and look for ways to give back. I mean, everybody has something.

You may have extra of something, you may have additional something, but don't be the person that you're just trying to hold on to, what you've worked hard to earn. I get it. But here's what I've learned. I have never been able to be more generous than I see come back into my life. I have. Even in all of, all of the earnings, whether it's financial things, material things, whatever, all that stuff comes and goes. But at the end of your life, you're not going to think about how many pairs of shoes you had, how many jackets you've had, what your clothing cost. It's not going to be what your car was.

You're going to be thinking about people. You're going to be thinking about your morals. You're going to be thinking about so many other things that have nothing to do with how much you've amassed. It's going to be about what you were able to give back. So reflect on, you know, on gratitude and appreciate what you have and look for ways to give the third thing is, I want you to work on developing that empathy. So try to understand other people's perspectives and challenges, you know? And a good way to do that is most of us spend our life comparing up. When you need to compare down, comparing up, basically, is they have more than me. Look at that.

This person's thing is better than mine. Whatever. Compare down. There's always someone worse than you. Now, unless you're sitting on top of everything, you know, I would say there's. You say, well, there's no one to compare up to, and all you can do is compare down. Well, no, there's some people that, you know, the people you need to compare up to is probably the people that have less than you because they probably have a better heart. They probably.

Because some people, when you sit up that high, nothing hurts, nothing feels that way. But you have voids in relationships a lot of times. So in your wealth and all your things, you have, there's no emotional benefit to that. You may feel like you can spend your money and do whatever, but there are a lot of very wealthy, alone people. There are a lot of people with lots of material things. And yes, they can buy things and spend money for things, but let me tell you, when it comes down to it, they're nothing full like you would think, maybe. So what I would say is, always compare down. Don't compare up.

Now, if you're wealthy, great work on your heart, though. Make your heart as wealthy as your checking account or your materials. Try to get your heart better. And if your heart does become that wealthy, trust me, you'll be willing to give more away and realize you don't need all that. Someone said to me one time, well, you say that because you don't have all that. And I say, well, you're right. And I don't know if I ever will have all of that. Maybe you could be.

But here's the thing. Every bit that I am mass, I'm always giving something away. So I don't know that I'd ever get there, because the more I get, the more I give, because that's built into me. So try to understand other people's perspectives. Don't compare up. Always compare down. And I learned that from a guy named Michael O'Neill, who is a podcaster who, when he lost his home and some other stuff that he had gone through, this was during the time of Katrina. He was.

He was at someone else's house or a hotel somewhere because he had. He lost everything. And he was looking at the television and he was seeing people stuck on roofs. They were even talking about bodies that were floating in the water. And he realized, man, look at me and look at what I mean. I can't believe I'm sitting here complaining over stuff. And look at where these people's lives are and look at the ones who don't have a life right now at all. Number four is stay informed by being connected.

Don't just disconnect because your life is good. Be aware of needs in your community. Be on the lookout. Pay attention to the world at large and see how you can be involved. And lastly, try to make service a habit. And what I mean by habit is try to create habits that you would spend the rest of your life trying not to break. Meaning, if you're trying to do good, make that your habit to do good to other people and spend the rest of your life concentrating all your energy in that direction. Having the habit of nothing, of doing good to people, and I'm going to do everything I can not to break it.

Find things that you can volunteer and do. So when you make service a habit, you're looking for ways I can give, I can volunteer, I can do, and what's cool for those of you. And I'm teaching a leadership course right now in the community I launched. And one of the things where I'm learning, where I'm sharing with them, what I learned is in community and learning how to volunteer. Because the way I learned leadership is to lead people. When you have no ability to pay them and you have to do it with vision, you have to do it with service, you have to learn to do permission, relationship. It's a big deal. A lot of people think they're great leaders.

If you want to prove your leadership, go volunteer and see who will follow you. And not just for one weekend. Do it on a regular basis. Don't do it because you have money to trick and bribe and do whatever else you can and coerce and, and make shiny things. The offering, no, make it the vision. Make it you. Painting people into the picture. Help them see what life could be like if show them how they can be change makers in the lives of other people.

Prove your own leadership, because leadership is influence. Do it through service of others, but make it a habit. And I want you to do it around something you care about and that's what will help you do it. So find something you care about and what makes you laugh, what makes you cry, what saddens you and then get involved. I mean, it's literally that simple. So as I wrap up, I just hope that you'll keep in mind you will. Again, I'm going to say this phrase. You'll never look into the eyes of another human being that does not matter to God.

However you want to receive that or not receive it. Find your way. Find your way to realize there is no greater value than to be in service of other people. Especially when you have plenty and you give. When you serve, it's not you give looking for the attention you give, even if nobody sees it or knows it ever. Because I believe God sees it and God knows. We were created to love and be loved. We were created to serve and be served.

We were created to give right? We were and to be able to receive as well. But work on that service part. Be in service of others. Look around you, find needs and help meet them. Help somebody else's life overflow. Especially if you've experienced that. So until next time, we'll talk soon.