You buy so many unnecessary things. Hundreds of rupees worth of cigarettes every day, harmful alcohol, or expensive clothes you'll never wear, left to gather dust in drawers year after year. Books upon books lining your shelves to satisfy some inner thirst, knowing full well they'll never be read.
Shoes you don't need but buy anyway; bedsheets and curtains you never use, countless decorative items for your home that you purchase and store away.
Sometimes, buy a few unnecessary things from these people too.
These souls bearing poverty's burden on their shoulders might sell these small items to buy a couple kilos of rice, half a liter of oil and salt, or a bundle of greens. If they're truly fortunate, they might manage a kilo of potatoes and two eggs from such a sale. If even this much doesn't sell, perhaps tonight this person will go to sleep on nothing but water.
Think about it—your small act of kindness could put two handfuls of rice on someone's plate. What greater worship could there be than this!
Perhaps these small items cost no more than your one-day tour expense, or a day's worth of cigarettes and coffee shop bills, or one day's restaurant meal.
What if, for once, you skipped the restaurant or didn't buy those unnecessary clothes; what if you cancelled that one trip—and used that money to buy something from these people instead? If nothing else, it will bring you infinite peace.
These people could have chosen to beg, to steal, to snatch and rob. Instead, they're trying to survive through honest means. If you and I don't buy from them, they might be forced to steal or beg... or else hang themselves with a noose, or die at home after days without food, suffering hunger's agony—deaths we would never even know about.
Think for a moment—can we deny that the responsibility for such deaths or suicides also falls on our shoulders? Someone eats well precisely because someone else cannot eat at all.
Come, let us be compassionate, let us help them live. This world doesn't belong to you and me alone—it's theirs too! In truth, we live in comfort at the price of their suffering.
Just imagine, for once—what if fate had made this very person your father or your brother!