The crowd was HUGE! I think there were six people listening. One was the next speaker, then there was my wife, one of the volunteer staff, a guy who did not make eye contact and looked more like he just needed a place to sit down to rest his legs. But, there were two women there who came and listened intently. Both lived alone but were friends and interested in disaster preparedness for themselves and their families. We spent a few minutes after my presentation chatting and I answered their questions.
Definitely not a big impact for a Saturday morning at the local mall. Yet, those two women count for something and my wife recited back a portion of my presentation today so something sank in somewhere.
I often call disaster preparedness messaging as being “missionary work.” You win people over to the cause of disaster readiness one single individual at a time. They in turn may influence many more people within their families or neighborhood.
Who knows—maybe a great victory for disaster preparedness was won on Saturday and I’ll never know it. Just when you think no one is listening to your messages may be the time that you have your greatest impact. Don’t give up, never surrender!
