31 random acts of kindness

[#1]

With February's community badge theme being "Random Acts of Community (RAOC)" it got me thinking over the past few weeks about the most amazing month of my life. It was May 2013, back when I was blogging regularly. This is what I wrote as part of my first blog entry for "31 random acts of kindness (RAOK)":

"I have wanted to do a random acts of kindness blog for the longest time – and now the time is finally here :)  I try to practice kindness every day but thought that doing a blog challenge would encourage me to think of something unique to do each day.  I saw this video back in early 2012 and I loved how the smallest little acts became contagious. You do something nice for one person and both of you feel great - all of a sudden it becomes a butterfly effect and kindness is everywhere. That special look in someone’s eye when you have done something kind or when they witness kindness is the most beautiful thing I have ever witnessed. Here is the video, you will understand my feelings once you watch it.

Every day was so much fun - looking for unique random acts to brighten people's days, and then writing about the experiences. The more things I did, the happier I got. The more smiles on people's faces, the bigger my smile grew.

On my last blog entry (Day 31), I wrote:

"Although my blog ends today, I know my random acts of kindness will continue. Kindness is truly the best feeling I have ever experienced, I had no idea the impact this month would have on my life.  Thank you to all of you who followed along on my little journey and also for those of you who started up your own kindness acts/initiatives as a result :)"

Doing kindness, has become natural to me as a result of this challenge, and I always give people the benefit of the doubt, and think the best of them and their intentions.

I am finding it more challenging to do "random acts of community" virtually with the 3.5M+ community members across the Globe, however I am trying - but I am in no rush to obtain the RAOC badge, I want to earn it authentically, and until then will have fun doing little acts of community here and there, until they make a difference :)

Would love to hear about your RAOK and RAOC experiences in the comments below. 

[Helen Griffiths _Capgemini_]

What a really lovely idea. I've just spent the last 45mins reading through your blog. I love the idea of leaving money in the toy machines for children to turn and get a toy!

[Jodi LeBlanc]

Thank you so much @Helen Griffiths _Capgemini_ for taking the time to read my blog post. That was a fun one, I didn't actually wait to see a child come to the machine, but the fun was envisioning their faces when they realized the machines were filled. When I was a kid I was always asking my parent for spare change for those machines and lots of times they only had bills. I think my favourite RAOK from the blog was the gift of time, spending time with the seniors in the nursing home touched my heart in so many ways ♡