Who You Are Speaks Louder to Me Than Anything You Can Say
At the beginning of my 8:00 a.m. class one Monday at UNLV, I cheerfully asked my students how
their weekend had been. One young man said that his weekend had not been very good. He’d had
his wisdom teeth extracted. The young man then proceeded to ask me why I always seemed to be so
cheerful.
His question reminded me of something I'd read somewhere before: “Every morning when you get
up, you have a choice about how you want to approach life that day,” I said to the young man.
“I choose to be cheerful.
“Let me give you an example,” I continued. The other sixty students in the class ceased their
chatter and began to listen to our conversation. “In addition to teaching here at UNLV, I also
teach out at the community college in Henderson, about seventeen miles down the freeway from
where I live. One day a few weeks ago I drove those seventeen miles to Henderson. I exited the
freeway and turned onto College Drive. I only had to drive another quarter-mile down the road
to the college. But just then my car died. I tried to start it again, but the engine wouldn’t
turn over. So I put my flashers on, grabbed my books, and marched down the road to the college.
“As soon as I got there I called AAA and asked them to send a tow truck. The secretary in the
Provost's office asked me what had happened. ‘This is my lucky day,’ I replied, smiling.
“‘Your car breaks down and today is your lucky day?’ She was puzzled. ‘What do you mean?’
“‘I live seventeen miles from here.’ I replied. ‘My car could have broken down anywhere along
the freeway. It didn't. Instead, it broke down in the perfect place: off the freeway, within
walking distance of here. I'm still able to teach my class, and I've been able to arrange for
the tow truck to meet me after class. If my car was meant to break down today, it couldn't have
been arranged in a more convenient fashion.’
“The secretary's eyes opened wide, and then she smiled. I smiled back and headed for class.”
So ended my story to the students in my economics class at UNLV. I scanned the sixty faces in
the lecture hall. Despite the early hour, no one seemed to be asleep. Somehow, my story had
touched them. Or maybe it wasn't the story at all. In fact, it had all started with a
student's observation that I was cheerful.
A wise man once said, “Who you are speaks louder to me than anything you can say.” I suppose it
must be so.
~ Lee Ryan Miller ~
The above story appears in Lee's book: "Teaching Amidst the Neon Palm Trees."
[ By: Lee Ryan Miller Copyright © 2005 -- submitted by: Lee Ryan Miller (lee @ LeeRyanMiller.com) ]
Inspirational Stories
SkyWriting.Net
All Rights Reserved.
|