I know, I'm a few days early. But, I'll be in New Mexico with Dancing in Socks Guy all next week, so I thought I'd do it now. My New Year's Resolution for 2008 is to ...
Perform Twelve Random and Anonymous Acts of Kindness
As with so many other things, the concept of a random act of kindness is not unique to me. But I've always admired people who did such things, and no doubt like many people, have often thought 'Oh, I should do that too'. But, also like many people, I seem to never get around to it.
One of my (many) failings is that I tend to focus on the negatives in my life, to the exclusion of recognizing my blessings. In other words, I can be a real self-centered bitch. Certain things could be better, true, but when I look around me I realize I have it infinitely better than so many other people. I'd like to stop being quite as self-centered as I often am, so I thought one way to try and work on that would be to focus on other people for a change.
Here are the ground rules:
1.) Perform one random act of kindness every month this year.
2.) Stay anonymous. That means not just with the recipient, but in my every day life and here as well. I may say 'Random Act of Kindness for the month of May was completed' and I may discuss how it made me feel but beyond that, nothing. Advertising what I did sort of contradicts the point of what I'm trying to do, and would make me a bit of an attention whore.
3.) The random act of kindness has to be something I wouldn't normally think of doing. Giving up a parking space or holding a door for someone doesn't count. This also includes contributing money to large-scale disaster relief (may that not be necessary this year). Not that I can't do that, or won't if I can afford to, but I would like to make this more about me thinking about what I'm doing for someone, rather than just doing the obvious. Besides, it's hard to do that in a way that's completely anonymous.
4.) That last sentence notwithstanding, the random act of kindness can involve a financial contribution of some kind, but it needs to be something thoughtful and purposeful, something geared towards a specific individual or individuals.
5.) The recipient doesn't have to be human, but because I'm, uh, already a bit of a crazy cat lady, if the recipient is a non-human, it must also make a human happy at the same time.
6.) This ties in with #4 -- whatever I do, it needs to be done thoughtfully. Which means planning. Which means not suddenly realizing it's the last day of the month and rushing out to do something half-assed just to fulfill the letter of the resolution and not the spirit.
7.) I will make an effort to ensure that the recipient(s) are people I don't already know, but there can be exceptions to this if there's a good reason for it.
8.) I realize all the preceding rules may put the randomness of this in question, so the last rule is that it should, wherever possible, be random for the recipient.
So, there it is. We'll see how I do. What about you all -- what resolutions are you making and why?
Elle
Perform Twelve Random and Anonymous Acts of Kindness
As with so many other things, the concept of a random act of kindness is not unique to me. But I've always admired people who did such things, and no doubt like many people, have often thought 'Oh, I should do that too'. But, also like many people, I seem to never get around to it.
One of my (many) failings is that I tend to focus on the negatives in my life, to the exclusion of recognizing my blessings. In other words, I can be a real self-centered bitch. Certain things could be better, true, but when I look around me I realize I have it infinitely better than so many other people. I'd like to stop being quite as self-centered as I often am, so I thought one way to try and work on that would be to focus on other people for a change.
Here are the ground rules:
1.) Perform one random act of kindness every month this year.
2.) Stay anonymous. That means not just with the recipient, but in my every day life and here as well. I may say 'Random Act of Kindness for the month of May was completed' and I may discuss how it made me feel but beyond that, nothing. Advertising what I did sort of contradicts the point of what I'm trying to do, and would make me a bit of an attention whore.
3.) The random act of kindness has to be something I wouldn't normally think of doing. Giving up a parking space or holding a door for someone doesn't count. This also includes contributing money to large-scale disaster relief (may that not be necessary this year). Not that I can't do that, or won't if I can afford to, but I would like to make this more about me thinking about what I'm doing for someone, rather than just doing the obvious. Besides, it's hard to do that in a way that's completely anonymous.
4.) That last sentence notwithstanding, the random act of kindness can involve a financial contribution of some kind, but it needs to be something thoughtful and purposeful, something geared towards a specific individual or individuals.
5.) The recipient doesn't have to be human, but because I'm, uh, already a bit of a crazy cat lady, if the recipient is a non-human, it must also make a human happy at the same time.
6.) This ties in with #4 -- whatever I do, it needs to be done thoughtfully. Which means planning. Which means not suddenly realizing it's the last day of the month and rushing out to do something half-assed just to fulfill the letter of the resolution and not the spirit.
7.) I will make an effort to ensure that the recipient(s) are people I don't already know, but there can be exceptions to this if there's a good reason for it.
8.) I realize all the preceding rules may put the randomness of this in question, so the last rule is that it should, wherever possible, be random for the recipient.
So, there it is. We'll see how I do. What about you all -- what resolutions are you making and why?
Elle
1 Kerfuffles:
Very neat resolution! I love it!
I like the idea of 'paying it backward', where people pay for the drive thru order of the person behind them in line. It's probably not a new concept, but a couple of our radio stations have been suggesting it. I haven't done it yet but I think it would be easy and fun. Except... I wouldn't want to enable anyone's french fry habit!
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