Anyone can make a promise.<\/p>\n
In many senses, a promise is a statement of intention.\u00a0 Your promise to do the dishes could easily be phrased as \u201cI intend to do the dishes.\u201d\u00a0 A promise isn\u2019t always a promise of action, but sometimes a promise of restraint, as \u201cI promise I will never cheat on you again.\u201d makes clear.\u00a0 Again, it is clear that we intend<\/em> to refrain from cheating.\u00a0 Sadly, by the time a person has developed enough to read, most people have personal experience that makes it clear not every promise will be fulfilled.\u00a0 Broken promises have brought about the popular saying \u201cThe road to Hell is paved with good intentions.\u201d<\/p>\n Another way to say it might be \u201cThe road to Hell is paved with promises.\u201d<\/p>\n I have broken many promises in the last 30 years of my life, certainly more than I can remember.\u00a0 I have a list of remembered promises that I am slowly trying to fulfill as time and circumstances allow.\u00a0 My intention is to fulfill all of them, but reality would seem to say that I will not.\u00a0 Some of the promises I made were foolish, impossible.\u00a0 Other promises were reasonable, but I wasn\u2019t making the promise as a declaration of my intentions, but rather as a tool to get what I wanted.\u00a0 I suspect you have done the same.<\/p>\n Promises are deceptively simple to speak, and oftentimes famously difficult to complete.\u00a0 As you look at the world around you, you can see the results of broken promises everywhere.\u00a0 Maybe it was a promise of reward or advancement upon completion of a difficult task.\u00a0 Maybe it was a promise of hope, a promise of a bright future. \u00a0Thousands were promised well-paying jobs upon completion of their college education. \u00a0Perhaps it is this promise you would find laying broken on the ground at the feet of the Statue of Liberty:<\/p>\n \u201cGive me your tired, your poor, Just as individuals have the power to make promises, so do governments and organizations.\u00a0 Like us, our governments make promises that are unrealistic or impossible to keep.\u00a0 In the same way, promises are used as tools to manipulate and change the will of the governed.\u00a0 There used to be a time when we would remove people from positions of power when they failed to keep their promises.\u00a0 Unfortunately, I believe that the time of being held accountable for our lies has passed.\u00a0 \u00a0The world suffers for it, as promises of humanitarian aid, of mutual assistance, or assured sovereign borders go unfulfilled.\u00a0 Promises of investigations into wrong doing are forgotten, or swept aside, as countries make promises to each other to protect their own interests in an investigation.\u00a0 What promises will be broken tomorrow?\u00a0 The next day?<\/p>\n A promise only has power when there is an expectation of fulfillment.<\/p>\n It is far more rare to find someone who expects the fulfillment of a promise than it is to find someone willing to make a promise.\u00a0 I wish that the tables were turned, that a promise was far more rare than the person who is willing to believe in it.<\/p>\n Scott Harrison is a man who makes promises.\u00a0 When Scott left his lucrative job as a night club promoter in New York City, he found himself halfway around the world, serving the poorest of the poor as a photographer for Mercy Ships.\u00a0\u00a0 2 years later, Scott founded Charity:Water<\/a>, an organization dedicated to bringing clean water to those in need.\u00a0 Scott promised an organization that would use 100% of the money it raised to directly affect the provision of sustainable clean water to those who did not have access to it.\u00a0 For those in the world of non-profit organizations, this was a foolish, unrealistic expectation.\u00a0 No one believed that it could be done.\u00a0 Scott stood by his promise, and has made many more since then.<\/p>\n
\nYour huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
\nThe wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
\nSend these, the homeless, tempest-tossed, to me:
\nI lift my lamp beside the golden door.\u201d<\/p>\n