My Inner Leeuwenhoek

O All that Is, let me manifest my inner Leeuwenhoek!  He had no formal training as a scientist - a tradesman, he became interested in the beyond-teeny world after using a magnifying glass to count the threads of a sheet - yet he's considered the Father of Mircroscopy  because of the advances he made in microscope design & use.

Anton Van Leeuwenhoek, through his curiosity & actions, revealed a previously unimaginable world of microorganisms.  He was the first human to see bacteria, protozoa, spermatozoa, rotifers, Hydra & Volvox, and even parthenogenesis in aphids. Astonishing!

Like Gregor Mendel, Leeuwenhoek was a brilliant amateur who surpassed the most credentialed intellects of his day.  Unlike Mendel - who neither sought nor received acclaim while he was alive - Leeuwenhoek received full recognition of his astonishing contributions to science, including being made a Fellow of the highly prestigious Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge (aka the English Royal Society), once it got past its skepticism that invisible living creatures could actually exist.  

Leeuwenhoek found a way to make superior lens in a surprisingly short time AND was savvy enough to keep that knowledge to himself, choosing to give the impression it was a complicated process.  He realized that had they known how basic the process was, others would appropriate his refinements, leaving him unrecognized, unknown.

There's a good lesson to be learned in that.  Leeuwenhoek valued his accomplishment & took steps to ensure that others valued it, too.  Would that I'd been more that way in my life; may I model it more in the present & future.  Because Leeuwenhoek didn't try to take as his own accomplishment the discoveries of others, just to assure his own didn't disappear, falsely attributed to men with scientific credentials & lofty degrees.  He simply brought to his scientific endeavors the perspective a successful tradesman who knows the value of his brand and takes steps to promote & protect it.

Let me manifest my inner Leeuwenhoek, finding ways to bring all that I've learned in the larger business world to helping show happier paths to senior care.  Let me, like him, find a simple way to create a superior product, then repeat it - a definition of creating a successful life, career.  Let me value my work enough to share any results with the world, as Leeuwenhoek did with his findings, without feeling like I have to share ALL of what I know.  Allow others to value what I do, because that is the only way anyone comes to have an influence.

And I do want to have an influence.  I do want to help change how people view working with older people who face increasingly frail health, even reduced memory retention, to see this as a key stage of our evolving character, our core spirit.  I do want to help families see joy-filled ways to work with older members who find themselves increasingly challenged by the changes often brought on by advanced years.  I do want to help my "grannie' clients celebrate life instead of resigning themselves to a hollow existence.  

Let me manifest my inner Leeuwenhoek ~  ~  so that, someday, someone may pray to manifest their inner Deev!