One of the goals I have in a purchase is to consider the working conditions that went into producing it.  Perhaps this value is being passed down, because last night my daughter was comparing dresses online and suggested that the super cheap ones were made by underpaid workers. She is probably right. I also buy chocolate from companies that do not use child slaves, and before I raised chickens I bought cage free eggs. Freedom is close to my heart, and I try to further the liberty of people whose names I will never pronounce.

C.S. Lewis wrote the Screwtape Letters, and one of the scenes has lingered in my memory. The devil advises his protegee Screwtape to keep his victims focused on spending all of their kindness on people across the ocean, anonymous orphans and widows whom they will never meet. Then they will be distracted from showing empathy to the people within arm's reach. Such as their own family.

The other day I listened to a friend who was feeling trapped by the words of someone she cares for. Her freedom was being impinged upon, and she needed support in hoisting up healthy boundaries.  I hugged her, willing the invisible tethers to snap. I wished it for the person she loves as well, because when we expend energy trying to control others we ourselves are bound too. The drive to control others is itself a cage.  

Thinking globally is a lofty aspiration. Yet it need not be at the detriment of our own small circle of influence.