I don't believe in coincidences. I believe that the family you are born into and every single person you meet, even in the most random of circumstances, is in your life for a reason.

My friend Wendy (who lives in Madison, WI) wrote me last week to say that her husband Nishant was reading my blog only to discover -- get this -- that we were on the other side of the world together at the same time in the exact same place. Turns out they were also staying at the Radisson in New Delhi on January 10th of this year.

Wendy sent me some great pix. She's a Ph.D. in psychology, but a photo journalist at heart. I'm looking at the photos she sent me of the hotel, half expecting to see myself in them. I spent all day in that lobby hanging out, working on my computer.

Wendy is one of my favorite people in the world. A true angel on earth. We met, god what, almost 20 years ago! We were just starting our careers in HR working at Andersen Consulting in Chicago. It might have been Arthur Andersen even, before A/C broke off as its own consulting firm.

We were bright-eyed, hard-working, dedicated professionals in our early 20s, fashionably clad in wool, plaid skirts with matching suit jackets and iron-curled hair. AHH! ...painful flashback to wearing nylons! Make it stop! It burns!

We had big plans. We attended each others' weddings, and soon after discovered that neither of our marriages lived up to our dreams (pre-Nishant, of course).

We were friends with Judi, too. I remember Judi telling me that she can't go out with Wendy anymore. She was only half joking. She said that Wendy was notorious for stopping and helping everyone, no matter how late it made them or if it took their entire evening off course.

I won't be able to tell it like Judi, but she said that once she was waiting for Wendy to come over and it was getting late. Finally, Wendy showed up with a little Indian man who she met on the street who was new to this country and needed directions. Since he didn't have any friends, Wendy figured he could hang out with her and Judi.

Anyway, that's Wendy. Good to the core. I was with her on her first blind date with her now husband, Nishant. They had been emailing for a while (a mutual friend set them up), and were to meet up in Chicago. Wendy planned to stay the night with me. She came to my house with tons of luggage! It was so cute. She was only staying one night, but she couldn't decide what to wear.

My friend Joe and I dropped her off at a bookstore downtown on Michigan Ave. The plan was for Wendy and Nishant to exchange their initial hellos and then we would meet up with them later for dinner. Joe and I liked Nishant immediately (not to mention, he treated us to some great Indian food! -- except for this horrible yogurt drink that we could barely keep down). We gave Wendy the big thumbs up, so I like to think we had a hand in the match-making. :)

Nishant grew up in India with his parents and a younger brother in a one room one kitchen apartment. They had a bathroom but no toilet; shared a common toilet with 3 other families.

I'm trying to picture this. I live in a studio apartment in NYC. If I had to share it with my parents and my brother, three of the most annoying people in the world mind you, I think I would have run away.

They moved to a one bedroom place when he was 15. Finally, a room they can study in! His parents gave them a good push by sending them to private English school -- which cost nearly 30% of their income. And from a very early age, he developed a view of the world that was entirely hierarchical. Who's above? Who's below? How can I improve my lot in life? Nishant shared with me:

Growing up, getting an ice cream or a pop was maybe possible once every couple of months to celebrate something. But now I can stop on the way home to get an ice cream if I feel like it. For me that is a luxury.

In India, poverty is all around you. I saw scantily dressed 15 year old girls going to the garbage dump to scrounge around for food after dark so that they are not embarrassed. Till today, I get physically sick in my stomach when I open up my closet and I see lot of clothes. I go on a goodwill spree after that and it calms me down. I have tried to help my relatives/friends in India when they have had tough times. I still don't feel that I do enough and I am glad about that because that will always pushes me to do more and not rest on my laurels.

We are going to India in January with Nikhil (their baby). I hope that as time goes on, I can take more trips with him to India and make him realize how fortunate he is. I hope that he realizes as he grows up that the lifestyle he is living is a privilege he has to work hard to earn and share and not an entitlement that he deserves.

I always see people who consider themselves compassionate and talk the big talk about poverty, disease etc but hide behind the wall, "We can't change the world" to justify their inaction.

So I am glad that there are people like you who are willing to make a difference whenever, wherever and in whatever way they can. There was a great line in the new movie Batman Begins, "It doesn't matter who you are deep down, it is what you do that defines you". And you are defining yourself in a way that is making a difference in peoples' lives. (Thank you, Nishant!)

It's me again (Julia). I liked this note. It makes me think of all I could be doing to make a difference -- that it's my obligation to make a difference -- but that there is so much I don't do.

I was talking to a colleague yesterday at work named Tim. He is really into the whole climate change phenomena and passionate about making a difference. Airplanes are a big part of the problem. When you ride in a plane, you become part of the problem. So, when you go on a trip, you want to calculate how much carbon you consumed and offset it by spending on something that corrects for the carbon output.

He sent me this note:

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To offset the carbon dioxide your flight to Africa produced, you need to:

1. Figure out how far you flew. You can do that here:

http://www.findlocalweather.com/forecast.php?forecast=pass&pass=howfarisit&icao=KDEN

2. Figure out how much carbon that produced. You can do that here:

http://www.lcltracker.com/drivenbythewind/dbwanalysis

3. Pay for something that offsets it...I did this with the same organization in (2) above - Driven By The Wind - which is run by a consortium including the organization whose founder I know, so I trust them.

Do it. You'll feel better for it!

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It's so smart, but deep down I'm thinking, sonofa@$%!! Don't I do enough as it is?! Do I need to be accountable for every-little-thing my life?

It's a natural reaction. We want to make excuses. We don't want to break the bank. Don't want to give away the farm. I'd like to live in a nice house someday. Don't I deserve that?!

And then I remind myself that I can have and do it all. But that comes down to playing big, not small.