My $100 Kindness Mission

--by keriann, posted Nov 25, 2010

I submited a kindness idea to Helpothers.org $100 kindness contest and I won. Armed with $100 and a mission - WOW! What an amazing week I just had! It started out last weekend - the first goal was to fill 20 “Smile Baggies” to give out.

I had so much fun all Saturday picking out the items to buy. I'm a single mom of a teenager, so the opportunity to buy something without worrying about whether it would hurt our monthly budget made me feel like I had won the lottery!

I picked out some practical items – a post-it note pad, pen, hand sanitizer wipes, and breath mints. But since it was a “smile baggie”, I also got some fun stuff too – microwave popcorn, hot cocoa, bubble gum, a smile stamp, and a small bottle of bubble bath.

I spent Sunday night bagging all the goodies and attached the following letter to each bag:

"HI! This “Smile Bag” is just for you. I hope it brings a smile to your face. It brought many smiles to my face as I picked them out for you. The Smile Bag was inspired by www.helpothers.org – which is dedicated to small acts of kindness. The idea is to make someone smile, to do something for someone (without expecting anything in return) – making the world a better place – one act of kindness at a time, one community at a time.

The second bag (with the Smile Card) is for you to give a smile to someone else. It could be someone you know - a friend, a co-worker, or a neighbor. Or someone you don’t – like the cashier at the store, the teller at the bank, or the lady that sits next to you on the bus. You will be amazed at how great it feels to bring a smile to someone else.

And I encourage you to keep the spirit a live. Go to www.helpothers.org for ideas, stories, and inspiration. Kindness is contagious!"

Because I wanted to remain anonymous I decided to bring 4 “smile baggies” (2 sets) to work each day (I figured it would be too hard to hide 20 smile bags). Then I set off “planting” them around the hospital I worked at. I left a set in the employee lunchroom near the microwave, in the employee locker room, in the nursing medical supply room, on a cleaning supply cart, in the copy machine room, etc. I woke each morning excited and had fun thinking of where to leave the next smile bag. It felt like Christmas!

Thank you helpothers.org for allowing me to experience such an amazing week. I hope that I was able to make a big splash and that the ripples from this week flow far and wide and never end. WOW!

6126 Reads

Posted by keriann
Nov 25, 2010
Comments (22)

Readers Comments

Bluebell wrote: You are a STAR, thank you for your kindness and keep spreading smiles, Love and Light and a Thousand Smiles, Bluebell

Spoonerism wrote: This is a great use of the $100 competition!! :-) I'd love to do this at work, but my office is too small... perhaps around the building, though I only have access to one floor. Thanks for sharing Keriann, sounds like you had a great time spreading your kindness around! :-)

northernlights wrote: Fantastic idea - thanks for sharing!
Keep smiling :)

MakeSomeoneSmile wrote: That is awesome! I love what you are doing with this and hope you have a great time making them smile! I am sure many can use them at a hospital! Bless you and keep up the great work! :)

PatKat wrote: A shut in told me the smile card i placed on her door was the only nice thing anybody's done for her all year --- even tho she didn't know it was me who did it --- she was teary-eyed and everything (my neighbor). Just goes to show you how this group is changing my life and affecting people so warmly. Thank you for my smile cards!

ironlady48 wrote: What a lovely idea; i will try this at school. Maybe you can come back and post the results if you hear about them.

Jessicaviv wrote: I just love it! My family and i are doing something like this. So far i have 8 bags going out and my family members have each pledged one. We call them humble holiday handouts, and are set to pass them out to strangers along with the smile cards on december 15th. I blogged about it here.

Jenn wrote: This is an amazing idea :)i can only imagine the smiles it brought to the people that found these "smile baggies"!

ccsbouvier wrote: That was really nice of you, it reminds me of the first christmas in people's park in berkeley,ca, i went there with a bucket of chicken and bags of warm items for the homeless, they were so happy to recieve the warm things and that some one thought of them, so thank you for that positive energy. God bless you too. :)

1golddragonfly wrote: This is a super idea and your enthusiasm is contagious. Great job! *hugs*

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