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Smiling with a Purpose in the Workplace

   Ever since I found this website and joined your wonderful group of 'SMILERS', I have realized the true power of a Smile.  Earlier, I used to smile a lot, (thankfully smiling has always come very easily to me), but after I joined this website, it has added a new meaning, and now when I smile, there is a purpose – to spread happiness - to keep on smiling until I receive a smile back. It so happens that I work in an ‘analyst department’ where the members are always ploughing away at their work quite seriously, clicking the mouse, typing in the numbers, searching the net... you know how it is.  Prior, to my joining the team there was always a loud silence, broken only by hushed whispers, mouse clicks or keyboard sounds.  But today, I must confess after more than six months of “smiling with a purpose”, I can see ... Read Full Story >>

Can A Cookie A Day Make A Smile Stay?

I was walking home from school one day and it happend to be a particularly cold and windy day. It was freazing and I was crazy enough to forget my hats and mitts.  You can imagine my cheeks were rosy red and my hands were as numb as numb can be. All of a sudden this old lady drives up beside me and asks if I would like a rode home. At first I said it was ok but she persisted and her warm smile melted away the thought that my parents drilled through my head which was never talk to strangers!  We had an awesome chat and she was just such a sweetheart. She told me her address and she dropped me off.  I didn't see her or talk to her for about a month and one night remembering her kind gesture I decided to return the favour. So, I ... Read Full Story >>

Two Wolves

Two Wolves - A Cherokee Parable An old Cherokee chief was teaching his grandson about life...   "A fight is going on inside me," he said to the boy. "It is a terrible fight and it is between two wolves."   "One is evil - he is anger, envy, sorrow, regret, greed, arrogance, self-pity, guilt, resentment, inferiority, lies, false pride, superiority, self-doubt, and ego."   "The other is good - he is joy, peace, love, hope, serenity, humility, kindness, benevolence, empathy, generosity, truth, compassion, and faith."   "This same fight is going on inside you - and inside every other person, too."   The grandson thought about it for a minute and then asked his grandfather, "Which wolf will win?"   The old chief simply replied, "Whichever one you feed."     ... Read Full Story >>

A Birthday Lunch With An Extra Smile

My son and I were out of town for the weekend.  Whilst we were out and about, we found a little cafe and decided to have lunch there.  After we had sat down at our table, I noticed an elderly couple having lunch at a table across the room.  I must have looked over at them a few times because my son asked me if I knew them.  I replied that I didn’t, but that they reminded me of my own grandparents.  When the waitress came over, I asked her if she knew them.  She said she did.  She said it was the elderly man’s birthday today.  I wanted to do something for them so I told the waitress that I wanted to pay for their lunch and gave her some money.  Sometime later, the elderly couple came over to thank us.  They were so excited that someone had bought ... Read Full Story >>

Kindness Even When It's The Challenging Kind

I always try to be kind where I can and it usually comes reasonably easily to me to be kind to strangers or semi-strangers. I’ve discovered that it seems to be harder for me to be kind to the people who are closely related to me. I like spending time with my grandparents, who live only 5 minutes away from me, but I sometimes find it stressful and challenging. At their age (they are over 75 years old) they seem to have accumulated a lot of resentment and negativity although they were not like this before. My grandma seems to say negative things about others at any opportunity and my granddad gets immensely stressed and hyper and highly strung about the simplest of things. Last week I visited them a couple of times, and ended up feeling really stressed myself at the end of each visit although there were some good moments. ... Read Full Story >>

Kindness Journey! Sent Inspiring email

Kindness Journey  I sent inspiring email to about 200 of my contacts. At the airport and in the plane, I prayed to God for well being of some people in the wheelchair and  prayed Samastha Loka Sukhino Bhavantu  May all the beings in all the worlds be happy during the day.  I packed up my kindness tools to start my kindness journey. I am grateful to my brother-in-law for getting me an uber taxi to get me to the airport. I gave Birthday card and some quote cards to the driver. On her approval I told her intense positive thinking story about a lady whose unwavering positive thinking saved her husband's life. I told Fatema's story about how one quote card changed her life for the better. I talked about KindSpring and told some cracked some jokes. The thanked me with smiles.  I give the things to remember that the God residing in me gives to the God ... Read Full Story >>

The Whisper That Was Never Lost

Been mentoring a young adult lately who had found himself in a dark place and couldn't see the way forward. We took our time and unpicked all the problems resolving them into manageable pieces. He really touched my heart, especially when it all seemed so insurmountable. Just yesterday however, he wrote: Hey, how are you? I just wanted to say, Man, you changed my life! For the past month, I was in a really bad mental space, freaking out over everything and feeling completely useless. But after talking to you a few days ago, something shifted. I took some time off, faced everything I was afraid of, and now… I’m not afraid anymore. I see that I only get to live once, so I'm choosing to live it fully. Thank you for helping me realize that. Thank you so much for being there when I was at my lowest. So this morning, I ... Read Full Story >>

Trusting in the Kindness of Strangers

While driving from my home on the long commute to work I noticed a car in front of me had a wobbly wheel. It was clear the wheel had been changed recently and had not been fixed correctly. On a slow road this would not present much of a problem but I knew the route and knew a motorway was coming soon where the traffic would move much faster and would be very dangerous as the wheel could very well come off at that speed. I was driving a large jeep at the time and the car in front was a small to mid-sized car driven by a lady on her own. So as I tried to flash my lights and wave her to pull over I was worried that looking in her mirror she would see a lone man chase her down in a jeep waving frantically for her to pull ... Read Full Story >>

A Bus Ride To Happiness

I have had a number of revelations about myself this year. One of which is that whenever I'm feeling sad or down, a foolproof way to cheer myself back up is to help someone else.

One day I was having a horrible time and nothing was going right. (I bet everyone knows how that feels.) So I just hopped on a random bus, wanting to just get away. Right when I got on I saw this sad dejected looking lady. I decided to sit beside her and try to start up a conversation.

When I talked to her she seemed very suprised but she chatted with me anyway. We talked about love and kindness and how there wasn't enough of either in the world. She told me about her deep struggles.

As she was walking off the bus she said that I was her angel and that God brought me to her. In that one conversation, in that one statement, I felt complete contentment and peace with life.

People can be in search of happiness all their lives and never find it. But I truly believe that loving and helping others is the perfect way to find it.

Christmas Gifts Of Kindness

by Doran Roggio It was the Christmas of 1973. I had just given birth to a baby girl a month earlier. Poverty was a way of life. I was on my own with two children, my infant daughter and a seven year old son. My daughter’s father was not around and I had little help from family. When my infant daughter was three weeks old, I fell asleep during a night feeding. Laying on the edge of the bed I dozed off, my arm relaxed and my tiny daughter slipped onto the floor. Her persistent screams frightened me and I thought it best to take her to the emergency room to make sure there were no injuries. Having no car or money, I called the local police department for a ride to the hospital. The officers were extremely kind and showed concern as I communicated the incident, over my infant’s persistent crying. Reaching ... Read Full Story >>

A Spontaneous Gesture

One day when I was walking towards my office in the morning rush hour, I saw an old and very poor lady sitting near the gate of my building. I guess she was begging for money.

So many strangers were moving around her, I saw that they were all ignoring her plight - busy in their own daily routine.  I don't know what it was, but something moved me to reach out to her.  I took out my lunch box and water bottle and gave it to her without giving it a second thought.

She was so surprised and happy.  A tear ran down one of her eyes.  It made me feel so good to help her a little bit and it reminded me that sometimes it takes very little to make someone smile and feel a bit more secure.  

A Boot Full of Kindness

My girlfriend and I went to a supermarket called Tesco.  It is a very big shop here in Poland, something like a Walmart for those in the states. Whilst we were there, a homeless man walked in wearing the most tattered clothes and very dirty.  He was using an old vacuum cleaner pole as a stick to carry his life's possessions.  He really was a mess and his face was as dirty as a chimney sweep's. My girlfriend was looking through some clothes and I was wandering around the shoe section, and to be honest, curiously staring as this dirty old frail man who was sizing up some shoes.  Now, anyone in their right mind would wonder, does this guy have the money to buy a new pair of shoes? Security had their eye on him, as I did. I went to find my girlfriend and told her, if that guy doesn't get a pair of shoes, we're buying him a pair.  ... Read Full Story >>

Helping Out A Mother

The other day I was really glad to be able to help a friend. She had gone back to full time work after years of staying at home to take care of her children. She has been finding it quite hectic, especially because her husband works away a lot and isn't able to help as much as he would like. She had an after-work meeting to attend in the evening and I suggested her children come over and have dinner at our house. I told her not to worry about rushing back because they would be just fine.  We had a lovely time together and my son enjoyed seeing the girls here too. Life being how it is, my friend was a lot later coming back than she thought she'd be. So, when she rushed up to my front door I stopped her, hugged her, and told her to breathe deeply. Her children were lying on the couch reading, ... Read Full Story >>

Cuddly Bears And Beenies

Today, when I was out in town, I went into the pound shop. Everything they sell costs £1.  

An Unexpected Surprise

One morning I heard someone trying to get their car out of the snow after a snowstorm. (A very common sound here in Montreal.) After a few minutes I realized they needed a push, so I got dressed ,went outside, and pushed the car. It only took about a minute and, feeling more cold than sociable, I walked back to my apartment, without really seeing the driver.   Months later I was at the corner store and the guy in front of me insisted on paying for the beer I was buying! It felt a bit awkward and I had to refuse repeatedly. When I reached the cashier she told me my stuff was already paid for and she couldn't take my money.     So, I was walking back home from the store and that same guy is fifty feet in front of me, all the way! It turns out he's my neighbor, ... Read Full Story >>

A Starfish On The Beach

There is always a reason things work out the way they do. When I first submitted my idea to the Kindness Contest, my plan was to implement a kindness day at our local hospital. This was to entail buying some parking tokens and giving them out, taping some ziplock bags of coins to the vending machines in the Emergency waiting area, buying a hardworking nurse or two some lunch, delivering some snacks & baking to the palliative care family meeting rooms. I still plan to do some of these in the future, but for now my plans had to change.   When KindSpring.org contacted me and told me that that they had chosen my idea I was packing to head south for a few months (we are snowbirds) I told them that I would check out the local hospital in Lake Havasu City to see if they would allow me to carry out ... Read Full Story >>

Flowers of Gratitude

As most of the flowers in my yard are gone for the year, I made a run to Walmart last night for flowers.

This morning I waited for the neighborhood school bus. As soon as I saw the bus, I flagged it down and gave the flowers to the bus drive Jeanette, who is also my neighbor. The look on her face was priceless!

My children are not school-age anymore, but I do have nieces and nephews that age. I think it takes pretty special people to do this job.

To safely drive, watch over, and deliver so many children is a great responsibility and one that is undoubtedly under appreciated!
 

Lotus Love For You

With love,
from me to all of you.
A lotus from within my pond,
it grew.

Reaching for the light as we all must,
morning dew shining of night's sweet dusk.

Lotus Meaning:
Throughout many cultures over time, the lotus has been a powerful image and a spiritual symbol. In Hindu, Buddhist and Egyptian religions, the lotus is considered a sacred flower.

Among its many meanings and significance, the lotus is a symbol of "spontaneous" generation, and so it also represents divine birth, spiritual development and creation itself.

Namaste

Thanksgiving Joy For A Homeless Man

Sometimes the people who are noticed the least can do the most to lift us up... On Thanksgiving morning I got up early to run in the local 5K, figuring it would give me the motivation to get back into running. It was barely above freezing that morning so everyone getting ready to run was hopping around trying to stay warm. On the side of the road, sitting in the grass, was a man wrapped in a blanket. It was pretty obvious he was homeless and as usual, most people pretended not to see him. I went over and talked with him for a few minutes before the race. In the midst of the idle chit-chat, he told me that he was a veteran and had hoped he might be able to earn a few dollars that morning to be able to go buy a Thanksgiving dinner. He had a glimmer ... Read Full Story >>

A SPECIAL MEMORY

I was on my way from work one Mother's Day, and I noticed a man pulled by the side of the road and he was trying to load these huge logs into the back of his pick-up truck. As he attempted to load a log, I noticed every vein and muscle in his body straining to complete the task, but to no avail. I stopped my car and offered a hand. The gentleman looked at me as though I might not have enough strength to assist, but since I was the only one offering help he accepted. Together we lifted the log into the back of his truck and then two more. Admittedly, I was grunting from the weight of the logs. As we were loading the logs, I wondered if he was a craftsman who might be making tables from the huge logs (recently cut down by the city), but he ... Read Full Story >>