PARABLE OF THE STARFISH

One day an old man was walking along the beach. It was low tide and the sand was littered with thousands of stranded starfish. The man started to walk very carefully so as not to step on any of the beautiful creatures. Since the animals still seemed to be alive, he considered picking some of them up and putting them back in the water. The man knew the starfish would die if left on the beach’s dry sand but he reasoned that he could not possibly help them all, so he chose to do nothing and continued walking.
Soon afterward, he came upon a small child on the beach who was frantically throwing one starfish after another into the sea. The old man stopped and asked the child “what are you doing?”
The child replied “I am saving starfish.”
“Why waste your time? There are so many you can’t save them all so what does it matter” argued the old man.
Without hesitation, the child picked up another starfish and tossed the starfish back into the water. “It matters to this one…” the child explained.