Kindness Reminders

After Rachel Scott was killed in the Columbine High School shooting, I watched her father, Darrell Scott, on a Larry King episode speak about the Rachel's Challenge program. It was an essay Rachel had written about kindness, "My Ethics, My Code of Life", that inspired the initiative and her family's wish to take her powerful message to high schools across the country. String-Ring is a huge fan of the Rachel's Challenge movement and donated our first 100 String-Rings to the project. We've watched the program grow into summits for educators and business with Rachel's simple message of kindness and compassion.

The gathering of a large group of people in a public place organized via social media is known as a flash mob. Some seem to be a spontaneous gathering of strangers while others are planned performances designed to amuse and confuse. Each with their own agenda, e.g., to support a particular cause, to market a product, to join in pointless fun antics like pillow fighting, and unfortunately some rogue mobs promote violence (mean people suck!). One thing is certain, the trend is growing in popularity.

The fact that the only thing I do worse than sing is dance, participating in anything performance wise is out of the question. So I was happy to hear about Medmobs, meditation flash mobs. Now that I can do!

I came across another brilliant TED Talks yesterday on compassion. This touches on the same issue of the Compassion for Care post I made last month. If compassion is good, why don't we teach it to our children, health care professionals, and vote for it?!

A Bill Cosby classic: Grandparents

Just how cute is this? 12 little children between the ages of 3 and 4 dress up in superhero capes to practice their superpower... kindness. Preschool teacher, Kristal Burns, transforms her students into a Good Samaritan Squad for bi-weekly community projects such as visiting nursing homes, cleaning up neighborhoods, collecting food for a food bank, making gifts for assisted-living center residents, and helping paint (with the help of parent volunteers) a fence for a community member needing assistance. It warms my heart to see these young children practice acts of kindness. And to accessorize a mission with costumes is the most adorable finishing touch.

These kids have touched the hearts of many and inspired similar programs across the country. I think Kristal is the biggest Superhero!

The preschool channel, Sprout®, launched a campaign promoting acts of kindness this month. The initiative plans to log 1 million acts of kindness reported from viewers as it's final goal. Experts agree there is no better time to start teaching traits of compassion and tolerance than in early childhood development. As a huge advocate of helping children develop kind characteristic and a Big Bird fan, I wanted to share this first PSA debut starring my favorite fictional canary. -sorry Woodstock

Kindness Counts Debut PSA, "Swing Set" by multivu

I received an email yesterday from my partner-in-kind, Whitney, sharing the news that Hug It Forward has been nominated in TWO categories in the 3rd Annual Stay Classy Awards. I blogged about the San Diego-based non-profit, Hug It Forward, last April and I'm happy to post this fun video encouraging you to vote and help them get to the next round.

Peace & Huge Hugs

I'm not alone when I complain about my doctor's office not returning a call, my health care provider looking at me with glazed over eyes not listening to my concerns, the medical staff misplacing test results, nor am I the first to be a victim of a lab error. But I have experienced all the fore mentioned and would like to see a change in the degree of compassion missing in the health care system. We Americans spend more than any other country per person on healthcare yet are among the least satisfied with the quality of care received. I realize the problems are splintered and there is no easy solution, but Compassion for Care is a great start.

I just watched this segment on Good Morning America with Dan Harris sharing the research behind compassion meditation, its benefits, and growing popularity.

Just one question, is that guy really named Fonzie? Ommm... Aaaaeeeyyy!

This is an update from last week's Annabelle's 1st "Pay It Forward" birthday post below:

I donated my favorite children's book, "I Love You the Purplest", to our local library in memory of Annabelle. I don't know Rebecca or Ian, Annabelle's parents, but I doubt that many of the 28,000 who committed an act of kindness in Annabelle's name today knew them either.

You have touched many lives today, Annabelle. Happy Birthday.