Be sure you take the right lesson

I saw a tweet recently that said: "An American taking a five-minute shower uses more water than a typical person in a developing country slum uses in a whole day." (http://bit.ly/zNI3lV)

It reminded me of a story I heard about a hunter who was living in a hut in Africa and one day he goes out and sees a lion bringing food to feed a hugry tiger.  The hunter is so impressed with this evidence of the world being a bountiful and plentiful place that he decides to stop going out to hunt every day.  Because if God will cause the lion to feed the tiger surely God will take care of the hunter too. 

So one day the hunter finally starves to death and when he gets his audience before God he asks "I saw you show me your love for the tiger by the lion's act of kindness.  Why didn't you show kindness on me too?" 

And God says "You learned from the tiger, you were supposed to learn from the lion".

Is it tragic that there are people all over the world who live in water-deprived areas?  No doubt.  But does that mean those of us who are fortunate-enough to live in the US should deprive ourselves or should world-leaders focus on making clean water more accessible to everyone on the planet?   I think this is a better approach.

Law firm marketing lesson: take your example from happy lawyers who have successful law firms, stay-away from tigers.