Rising higher

On the beach, the teacher spoke to the students through a handheld loudspeaker:

• In this game, each team must find a way to get its representative to stand at a height of 8 metres. The first team to finish will win tickets for the whole team to see Mission Impossible 7 next week.
  The teams went off to separate corners and huddled to plan.
  After five minutes of discussion the teams scattered to look for materials such as poles, rope, pliers, hammers, all sorts of things.
  Only Hùng's team, the Brown Bears, chose a corner of the beach and began using buckets to fetch sand from elsewhere and pour it onto their own patch. The sand was mixed with water to make it firmer. A frame was hidden inside. The Brown Bears piled up the mound, shaped steps into it, and shaped decorative forms into this sand mound as well.
  An hour later a few other teams began to cheer that they had reached 8 metres and put their people on top. Those teams had lashed crossed poles together, quickly reached 8 metres, and sent their bravest member to climb up and stand at the very top to shout and have photos taken.
  Fifteen minutes later all the teams had completed getting their people up to 8 metres, except Hùng's Brown Bears, who were still busily bringing sand mixed with water to build up their mound, with poles inside as a frame as well. The teacher and all the students, more than 150 of them, stood watching the mound grow higher, and its beauty began to appear in all its grandeur.
  Then, with understanding, everyone went to fetch sand mixed with water to help build the mound and help make its beautiful relief carvings. Thanks to everyone's help, in the end the sand tower stood majestically on the beach with many unique patterns. Everyone danced around cheering and singing patriotic songs. The holidaymakers swimming at the beach also came over to admire it and take countless photos...
  The teacher spoke through the loudspeaker again:
• Whom do you choose as first place, to get the cinema tickets next week?
  The students shouted: The Brown Bears!!!
  Hùng was invited up to speak. He said:
• Respected Mr Khang, dear friends. First of all, I thank our teacher for creating this challenging game. I also thank you for helping to build this wonderful wet-sand mound, and then for voting for the Brown Bears to win. But in truth, this glory belongs to the solidarity of all of us, not to any one person.
  Teacher, friends, I think that to rise high is not to look up at the heights but to look down and cultivate everything at one's feet. You looked up, so you tried to climb as fast as you could, and you did it, well done. The Brown Bears followed the opposite philosophy: to build up the foundation carefully first, with what we have, and what we have here is sand and salt water. Your ladder is one that only the brave dare climb, while this mound is one that anyone can climb. Besides, with this sand mound we have plenty of room to make unique patterns. We spent five times as long as you, but the result is truly something to be proud of. What is admirable about you is that as soon as you saw what the result would be, you quickly gave up competing and turned to contribute to this mound, and even helped build the interesting patterns. Without your help the Brown Bears might have had to work until midnight. Here, this sand mound has shown your ethics: you were ready to support what is good and beautiful in life instead of clinging to glory for yourselves alone.
  This spirit of yours will carry our country forward together with the world.
  After building this sand mound together, I suddenly understood the deeper meaning and the lesson Mr Khang wanted to give his beloved students. Now the tourists out there are delighted to be photographing the sand mound, and in here I bow my head before you, before your hearts, before your ethics. And I would like to kneel and bow to our teacher, now that I understand his wisdom and his boundless heart towards us. This sand tower will be gone in a few days, but the lesson the teacher has given us will go with us for the rest of our lives...
  Next week we will chip in so that there is enough to buy tickets for the whole group to go to the cinema, as our teacher wished.
  Everyone applauded loudly. The tourists standing and listening applauded and praised them as well. 👨‍👨‍👧‍👦

To go up, do not keep staring upward; look down and cultivate everything where your feet are. A beautiful dream for the future must be built through the small things of the present. If each task is done properly right now, in the present, the high tower will rise by itself, little by little.
Sometimes we sacrifice the present for the future. For the sake of the future we abandon present affection, for the sake of the future we give up the good we ought to do now. Beware: that imagined future will never appear. But if we gather up each small good deed in the present, helping someone with whatever we can, loving someone as best we can, then right in the present all that is beautiful gradually appears.

If we do good things in the present, the future will become good by itself.