this post was submitted on 12 Jul 2023
612 points (98.4% liked)
Asklemmy
44156 readers
882 users here now
A loosely moderated place to ask open-ended questions
If your post meets the following criteria, it's welcome here!
- Open-ended question
- Not offensive: at this point, we do not have the bandwidth to moderate overtly political discussions. Assume best intent and be excellent to each other.
- Not regarding using or support for Lemmy: context, see the list of support communities and tools for finding communities below
- Not ad nauseam inducing: please make sure it is a question that would be new to most members
- An actual topic of discussion
Looking for support?
Looking for a community?
- Lemmyverse: community search
- sub.rehab: maps old subreddits to fediverse options, marks official as such
- !lemmy411@lemmy.ca: a community for finding communities
~Icon~ ~by~ ~@Double_A@discuss.tchncs.de~
founded 5 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
Paraphrased probably, but:
“What is an ocean but a thousand drops?”
It’s a really good way to get rid of the mentality of one person can’t make a difference. Because everyone is a drop, and without so many drops, there is no ocean. Maybe one individual drop doesn’t truly make a difference alone. But what if every drop was gone?
It helps me feel that, even if the difference I make isn’t big enough to make an impact, an impact only exists BECAUSE of all the drops.
That goes for both positive and negative things. A thousand bad drops are needed to make a bad thing. A thousand good drops to make a good one.
Sorry to question it, seeing as you like it so much, but doesn't that not make a difference if you're still fairly sure there's not enough other drops?
I prefer the starfish on a beach analogy for the same thing because it cuts others out entirely.
Hm. Good question, and I can’t say I have a great answer.
I like the starfish one too, the ocean one is just better for my mindset.
I guess accountability? The starfish story appeals more to personal ego (not using the term ego as a bad thing here), where as the ocean one feels more like accountability to me.
Starfish is saying that the little thing you do can help someone, even if it doesn’t solve the problem. Ocean one is saying that everyone is responsible, even if only a tiny bit in the grand scheme.
I kind of pair it with a mindset of if every drop thinks that they don’t make a difference, that adds up. One person can’t save the planet, but every person thinking they can’t save the planet means that you have that ocean of people all thinking that they don’t matter. And that’s a big problem.
Like I said, probably not the best answer. Just rambling what came to mind.
Hey, if it works for you, I guess. I find I'm easily frustrated if I imagine there's a ton of other people working against me but that's really my issue.