My Meandering Mind

I quit giving. It's almost been a year since I resolved that I would do an act of kindness every week and blog about it here. There were days sure, I helped where I could, donated and tithed my paychecks, but that doesn't count. I know it in my heart.

See, the thing is, I'm a coward.

I quit giving because my giving wasn't received. I still cringe a little at the fistful of flowers I had planted in the snow thrown into the street. Not one to give up immediately, I decided that maybe I just needed to set my sights on bigger visions. Serve Bigger. Love Bigger.

But I am no big person. I am only me, just one--and lately feeling completely insignificant person who is unworthy of giving to the world anyway.

The message is given over and over. First in kindness and now in yoga. I used to teach, have a lot of people in my classes, but when I began working full time, fell in love, and started a Master's program, I had less time to teach. So people drifted to other classes. Or maybe they drifted because my worst fears are true: I am an unworthy teacher. My messages are worthless, what I give to the world is of little to no value.

So I quit giving--because I couldn't give as big as the prom at the nursing home every week. And my little random acts of kindness, maybe were just random and stupid to the receiver. Coward!

Because a courageous heart would keep on giving regardless of the results. Forgive me for my meandering mind and trembling heart. I am trying to be more brave. I will give again on this Thursday. Revive Sweet Thursdays and maybe in 2011 have the courage to continue what I started, without being attached to the results.

That's the only choice isn't it? To keep giving even if people don't want to receive. To keep loving, even when your love is nothing special. Mother Theresa said, "In this world we cannot do great things, only small things with great love." I can give. Continue to live my small life with the greatest amount of love and gratitude possible.

So I will try.

I am so grateful for everyone who helped to make this event happen. It was such a blessing to be able to see my idea come to fruition by the helping hands of so many others. Who says the world isn't full of kindness? Of beauty? Of people who are capable of inspiring others with their shocking grace and compassion? If there's any doubt, let it be seen here:
































The event was a success---so much so that yesterday I overheard that a woman who hadn't walked in 11 months was inspired to try again. I had help from Crystal and Jackie with hair and make-up, Meredith and my parents came to help set up decorations, the whole Churchill family made the vent with their dancing, beauty, and compassion for others---and several gorgeous high school girls arrived to model the dresses of today. The room blossomed with smiles and dance and laughter, and my heart is alive with so much gratitude and inspiration for how amazing this world is--or at least my little corner of it.

I'm sorry

To anyone who actually might read this, I'm sorry. I have been doing Acts of Kindness, but man have I been slacking about actually sitting down to blog. So....here are a few highlights:

Today Will Be A Good Day:

It's amazing, isn't it? The power of words. It's almost as if they have the power to cast spells over us. Hear something enough, and you begin to believe it, and believe it and you begin to see it all around you. So I chose a few simple words, wrote them on pretty spring-colored card stock with scalloped edges, tied ribbon to them and attached them to:

I found these gorgeous Vicotrianesque roses on sale at City Market, and they were too beautiful not to share.






So I left a rose and a note on various windshields and doorsteps before work.








And I don't know about anyone else's day, but mine was really great.

Also in the highlights:

For friends who have been sick with icky spring colds, or who are super-stressed because this time of year always gets so busy for teachers, I have been making lavender-rose bath salts. They smell amazing and have detoxifying and relaxing properties because of the essential oils in them. I know this isn't exactly random, but I have made them for quite a few people now.











Working on the prom--not much time left, and still soooo much to do. Any one want to chaperone? :)

Sweet Thursdays are Saturdays or Sundays

More and more often. I'm sorry I haven't written for the last two Thursdays about my acts of kindness! I'm not so sure they are the best to advertise, because I don't know how legal they are...

This time of year, I always am craving new music--spring is such a beautiful time for new beginnings. So to share in the music I find, I make mix cd's and leave them in random places around town, on the windshields of people's cars, front steps..I've even sent out a few in the mail to friends who have been feeling down.

I'm sure it doesn't necessarily comply with anti-piracy laws, but maybe the reproduction of music for a good cause can be forgiven?

Do It Anyway..I will--but on Saturday.

Another completely hectic week. Forty hours at work, four hours in the weeee hours of morning subbing for a friend's yoga class, frantically studying for my March 15 mid-term, writing proposals and drafting prom plans for the nursing home, and my brother is home for spring break!

So my act of kindness will have to wait until Saturday. I already have it planned :)
For now, I stumbled upon these inspiring words today, said to have been tacked to Mother Teresa's wall in Calcutta:

"Do it Anyway"

People are often unreasonable, irrational, and self-centered. Forgive them anyway.

If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives. Be kind anyway.

If you are successful, you will win some unfaithful friends and some genuine enemies. Succeed anyway.

If you are honest and sincere people may deceive you. Be honest and sincere anyway.

What you spend years creating, others could destroy overnight. Create anyway.

If you find serenity and happiness, some may be jealous. Be happy anyway.

The good you do today, will often be forgotten. Do good anyway.

Give the best you have, and it will never be enough. Give your best anyway.

In the final analysis, it is between you and God. It was never between you and them anyway.

Turning A New Page

So, I was frustrated. My attempt to provide a little magic and wonder by planting fistfulls of Gerber daisies in the snow on random front lawns did not provoke magic and wonder in many of the receivers. One house took them in, but 3 left them--or worse--threw them in the street.

Generally, I'm not giving with attachment to response, but I am doing this to make small differences in people's every day lives. To bring beauty, magic, wonder, curiousity, belief in the good--in small ways in the lives of others every week. The castaway daisies made me rethink some things. So on Thursday, I did no small act of kindness. I thought about how to make a bigger impact, how to bring more of the community together, how to care for those who might need or welcome it with a little more warmth.

And I wrote up a proposal Thursday night, pitched it to the Activities Director at E.Dene Moore on Friday, and got the green light to:

Plan a Prom at the Nursing Home! on April 24th. I am hoping to get local hairdressers to style the women's hair that afternoon, and I have permission to borrow decorations from the high school prom which is the week before. I'm thinking Glen Miller and Cole Porter and wheeling people around the dance floor. I'm thinking the women deserve tiarra's if they want them, and punch if allowed, and maybe a red carpet walk with some of the kids from the high school decked out in their best from the week before.

I will have a lot of planning and work to do before then, and after this week, I'll continue with my small acts of kindness; but this way I can bring more people together and maybe make a bigger difference in the small corner of the world I'm living in.

Better late than never?

Okay, I actually did this on Thursday, but I have been house sitting all week in a house with no internet. Today I ventured home for more than 15 minutes, and finally am catching up on long overdue on-line errands.

If you're local (assuming anyone reads this at all :), you'll remember the nasty snowstorm that came Saturday and Sunday. How blessed are we this Sunday with blue skies? Anyway, Glenwood is a winter wonderland, and I was frosty and bitter about the cold. It's wearing on me, this lack of spring. But enough grump! I decided some color was in order.

Gerber daises are bright, beautiful and can seem like sunshine where there is none. So I bought two bunches, and split them into five smaller bouquets. Early Thursday morning (5:30 a.m.), I was out the door with fistfulls of color. I planted them in yards at random in the snow.

I don't know if anyone brought them in from the cold, but this small act brightened my day and warmed my soul.