In his four decades as a Harvard University psychiatrist, Dr. Barrie Sanford Greiff heard thousands of his patients, colleagues, and friends express a common yearning: to create meaning in their lives beyond material wealth and to pass something more than simply money on to the next generation. How, they asked, can we repay the world for the sacred gift of life? How can we share our lives and contribute to a better tomorrow?

The answer for tomorrow, as Dr. Greiff thoughtfully and clearly explains, is to build a legacy today, "to bequeath not only what we have earned, but what we have learned." In this warm and joyous volume, he tells the heartfelt stories of real legacies--of men, women, and even children who have found remarkable wisdom in the course of everyday life.

Be as a stone cast upon
the water, that the
positive influence of
your action may extend
far beyond the power of a
mere pebble in the hand
of a man.
-- Ancient Saying