Stories Matching 'Kindness' Tag (232)Environment Research New Ideas Public Transportation Children Inspiration Teachers Seniors OnThe Road Grocery Store Money Workplace Animals At Home Anonymous Friendship Kindness Kindness of Strangers Courage Small Acts of Kindness Health and Wellness Generosity Sharing Family Respect Neighbors Reconciliation Smile Cards Advice Good Samaritan Giving Money Giving Ability School Church Youth Collective Arts Creative Kindness Random Act of Kindness Homeless Travel/Vacation College/University Holidays Internet Birthday Sharing Food Emergency/Disaster Community Relationships Paying-It-Forward Coffee Shop/Restaurants $100 Kindness Idea Smile Decks Thank You Serendipity A Simple Prayer--posted by Shelley, on Apr 16, 2006
comments (12) | email this | print | permalink London Cabbie's Payment-in-Kind!--posted by T.S., on Apr 25, 2006
comments (7) | email this | print | permalink The Karma of Kindness--posted by VM, on Apr 28, 2006 My wife and I were at the bookstore the other day and we were helped by a young woman in finding a book, and something about this woman just told me she needed to get tagged! So my wife wrote a beautiful note addressed "To the woman in the light green sweater and curly, brown hair" with a quote that said "Sometimes our joy is the reason for our smile, and sometimes our smile is the reason for our joy," along with a small box of Godiva chocolates ... We gave it to another employee who read the whole thing and left it for her to come back to. Now they say that in giving we receive, and maybe it was a coincidence, but minutes later, I ran into one of my best friends from high school, who I hadn't seen for about a decade! comments (10) | email this | print | permalink Family Kindness Journal--posted by Yvonne, on May 10, 2006
comments (6) | email this | print | permalink Bystander No More--posted by Michelle, on May 13, 2006
comments (10) | email this | print | permalink Roses and Newspapers--posted by Tamara, on May 19, 2006
Hi I'm 12 years old and I recently saw a movie called 'Pay It Foreward'. It was all about doing random acts of kindness. comments (4) | email this | print | permalink An Interview With Sharon Salzberg--posted by Joey, on Aug 27, 2006
comments (2) | email this | print | permalink Kindness on my Doorstep--posted by mrgreen, on Sep 14, 2006
comments (5) | email this | print | permalink Lost Wallet and six-hundred Dollars worth of Kindness--posted by dees67mustang, on Dec 20, 2006 Yesterday, while at a bank machine in a very poor part of town, my husband and I found a wallet. We opened it up to look for ID and the first thing we saw was a picture of a toddler sitting on Santa's knee. We knew we had to find this father. We found his drivers licence and gave him a call. His wife answered the phone and told us he was out looking for his wallet. We left our phone number and 10 minutes later he called. He told us because of the poor area of town his friend told ... comments (18) | email this | print | permalink Children Have The Best Hearts--posted by ljcrowefamily, on Dec 24, 2006
comments (20) | email this | print | permalink Costco Love--posted by earthling, on Dec 27, 2006
comments (15) | email this | print | permalink Words of encouragement--posted by silentdreamer, on Jan 7, 2007 Today I walked into a shop and was served by a young boy - he must have been around 18. He was being told off by his boss for something. Even if what his boss was saying was valid, which I do not know, because I do not know the full story, I still felt that the way he was being treated was unfair. He was being put down in front of customers and all the other staff. The boss told him that he should not serve in the front of the shop anymore, where he deals with customers and should serve at ... comments (16) | email this | print | permalink An Experiment in Teaching Children Philanthropy--posted by Author Unknown, on Jan 30, 2007
comments (13) | email this | print | permalink Thank you for your kindness!--posted by ieiblue, on Feb 16, 2007
For the past 5 days, I was down with viral flu and I wasn't really feeling well. My father lost his job, I've had trouble in my work and a lot more trouble I can only imagine.I can't help but cry. What keeps my sanity for these agonizing days? You guys in here - people I really don't know personally but by your never ending stories of kindness. I know at one point I'll be able to stand up and gain whatever helplessness I am feeling in my heart now. I really just want to thank you for letting me feel your kindness here in my heart. comments (23) | email this | print | permalink Three Important Things--posted by singlestep, on Nov 26, 2007 Three things in human life are important. The first is to be kind. The second is to be kind. The third is to be kind. - Henry James Less than a snowball's chance in Madurai- the heart that encounters Unexpected Kindness in the world. And today I want to talk about Kindness. The way it follows you around the world. Wakes you up in the middle of a long train ride in an unfamiliar country to gently ask if you’d like some tea and when you say yes- makes it for you with such grave sincerity that you can’t help but wonder ... comments (32) | email this | print | permalink Be Vocal In Times Of Beauty--posted by singlestep, on Apr 10, 2007
comments (32) | email this | print | permalink A Lift From The Storm--posted by tambu, on Apr 21, 2007
My daughter works in a drive-thru coffee shop downtown. Our town is small, so we know just about everyone that goes by. comments (22) | email this | print | permalink You Are So Beautiful To Me--posted by Aurelia, on May 24, 2007
comments (20) | email this | print | permalink Snail Mail Surprises--posted by brighteyes, on Jul 29, 2007
comments (29) | email this | print | permalink Paid In Full With One Glass of Milk--posted by brighteyes, on Jul 27, 2007 "One day, a poor boy who was selling goods from door to door to pay his way through school, found he had only one thin dime left, and he was hungry. He decided he would ask for a meal at the next house. However, he lost his nerve when a lovely young woman opened the door. Instead of a meal, he asked for a drink of water. She thought he looked hungry and so she brought him a large glass of milk. He drank it slowly, and then asked, "How much do I owe you?" "You don't owe me anything," she replied. ... comments (48) | email this | print | permalink Grocery Store Flower Bouquet--posted by treeflowerpuzzle, on Aug 15, 2007 Many years ago, my husband and I were at a neighborhood grocery store with our two sons. My elder son has Downs Syndrome and his baby brother was also diagnosed with mild autism a few years later. Right as we were passing the floral department, a lady who worked there, handed me a bouquet of flowers. Unexpectedly. "These are for you," she said. "I've been looking for someone to give these to!" She said she would tell the cashier at the checkout that they were free. The gesture brought tears to my eyes. My son with Downs Syndrome is now 12 years old and my "baby" is 8. I draw on this kind incident to give me strength when people have given me rude and even verbally abusive comments, when my children have had problems being in public. Receiving those flowers has really made a deep impression on my life. Thank you, to that kind lady in the floral department that day! comments (24) | email this | print | permalink Tire-It-Forward--posted by keymaker, on Sep 26, 2007
comments (38) | email this | print | permalink Miracle Man's Wedding Proposal--posted by Pete, on Oct 3, 2007
comments (13) | email this | print | permalink A Goal of Kindness, Smiles, and a Slurpee.--posted by snowflake66, on Oct 10, 2007 Last week I decided I would choose one thing to be kind about and really focus on achieving that goal. That goal was to allow anyone who wished to, go ahead of me -- putting others' needs first before my own, no matter what. And let me tell you, this was not easy. Especially driving :) But true to my word I let others go before myself. Drivers who needed to merge were, with a smile and a wave, allowed in front of me (much to the distress of the people behind me -- so I guess I didn't really make ... comments (25) | email this | print | permalink The Wall Outside the Window--posted by Purvi, on Oct 18, 2007 Two men, both seriously ill, occupied the same hospital room. One man was allowed to sit up in his bed for an hour each afternoon to help drain the fluid from his lungs. His bed was next to the room's only window. The other man had to spend all his time flat on his back. The men talked for hours on end. They spoke of their wives and families, their homes, their jobs, their involvement in the military service, where they had been on vacation. Every afternoon, when the man in the bed by the window could sit up, he would pass the time ... comments (36) | email this | print | permalink Confronting Road Rage With Compassion--posted by Megan, on Oct 26, 2007
comments (32) | email this | print | permalink An Antique Coke Bottle--posted by Cyrano, on Oct 30, 2007
comments (24) | email this | print | permalink In The Middle of Nowhere--posted by SaraJ22, on Nov 6, 2007
comments (32) | email this | print | permalink A Tiny Gesture At A Local Fair--posted by learning2listen, on Nov 12, 2007
comments (11) | email this | print | permalink An Unforgettable Classroom Exercise--posted by freeHUGSrock, on Nov 15, 2007 One day, a teacher asked her students to list the names of the other students in the room on two sheets of paper, leaving a space between each name. Then she told them to think of the nicest thing they could say about each of their classmates and write it down. It took the remainder of the class period to finish their assignment, and as the students left the room, each one handed in the papers. That Saturday, the teacher wrote down the name of each student on a separate sheet of paper, and listed what everyone else had said about ... comments (61) | email this | print | permalink
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As a single mom, it is often hard for me to provide those little "extras" my children seem to want.
Last week, I was running a little late on my way to my first day at a new job in East London. I had injured my achilles heal a couple of days before and didn't want to put too much pressure on it by running to the tube station so I decided to jump in a cab just to get to the station. 
I was with my oldest son and we were on the lookout for an open parking space in our jam-packed shopping center. We spotted a perfect one in the next row of spaces, and I manouvered our van around the turn, all the while hoping no one else would spot it and grab it before I could. And, as luck would have it, a lady was wheeling her shopping cart right in front of us, and it looked like it was getting away from her - crammed with bags and cartons of soda underneath. She herself was ... 
What does kindness mean to you?
I think the associations people have with kindness are often things like meekness and sweetness and maybe sickly sweetness; whereas I do think of kindness as a force, as a power. When I look back over the instances, the encounters of my life, even when I just look around at the world, there's something that moves me so strongly that really is inspiring and uplifting about people just taking the time to pay attention to somebody or going a little bit out of their way to seek to help them. I can almost feel the ... 
I came home from work one day to find some business cards and a card holder in the street. Not much, but I figured the person might want them so I called the number only to find out the person was a seasonal employee. No worries, I thought I would just throw the cards out since they didn't seem to be of much value. 
This year, my family applied for Christmas Assistance from the Salvation Army. I'm a single mom and have not been able to work. Dad's a bit of a non-entity and was fired earlier in the year so times have been really tough. My son has been in and out of the hospital for six years with severe kidney disease. He is 8 years old and his brother is 7.
My sons know we have money troubles, but not the mass extent of it. They have and will always be provided for as I have a very loving and supporting set of parents.
We were at ... 
Once a year, I give my two children money. The only hitch is, they have to give it away. I give them each $100. They know it is a lot of money, so they are careful how they use it. It is their job to find out who in our community is doing things that they feel good about, and then decide who will get the money, and why.
Giving away money, even if it is only ten or twenty dollars, is a tremendous way to learn about the positive work people are doing right in your own neighborhood. It makes ... 
To stand up and speak out against cold injustice, against the blind wrong-doing that we see in the world-- that is one kind of activism. But there is another kind. A rarer form of fire-in-the-belly commitment to a much less talked about cause. Tell me, do you stand up and speak out when you encounter a moment of unexpected joy, warmth, beauty or compassion in your life? Do you stop to say so when you stumble across something that makes you smile- or are you in the dull habit of registering the remarkable without remark? Are you a bystander of ... 
I was attending a Fundraiser Gala Celebration for a school. Now, I've recently lost weight and felt good about how I looked in my outfit ... which I hadn't felt in years!
Once I got to the event, many people where telling me how wonderful I looked. To be honest, it felt great to hear that because I worked really hard to look and feel better.
Then, all of a sudden, I was thinking how I wished someone had given nice compliments last year when I was heavier. I did look nice then too, I had a nice outfit, pretty hair and carried ... 
I keep scissors handy on my sofa side table to clip interesting articles and coupons that my friends & family may like.
Once a week, I sort them into different piles and send it thru the mail to distribute.
I received many thank you's for the interesting articles, so I started to clip out funny cartoons, inspirational stories, share poems and pick up stick-um's and other surprise goodies too! I stuff them into the letters especially if I know the person needs a pick-me-up ... it's fun and not expensive at all ... and everyone loves the "snail mail surprises."
Lastly, when I ... 
One of my friends, let's call him Jose, is one of those guys who doesn't even need to say anything and people will just feel comfortable in his presence. He is an amazingly compassionate guy, who will flat out tell you that his purpose in life is to bring more beauty on this planet. No, if's, and's, but's ... clear and simple, unwavering in his life mission. He doesn't need to convince anyone and he can't be swayed from it by anyone else.
It's a funny story about how he learned his initial lesson of compassion.
He was madly in love with ... 
Three events, five hours. That was my Saturday evening schedule. It would've been nice to thoroughly enjoy one event, but how can you pick between a high school friend's first baby shower, cousin's i-am-turning-five birthday party, and a suprise proposal between two friends who met at your house?!?
So my wife and I zoomed in Fred's beamer, from Milpitas to Santa Clara to San Francisco, and the excitement was building as we landed at Buca di Bepo at 7PM. We had no idea what the evening would hold.
The plan was for Pete to propose to Linda, and bring her ... 
My husband and I had been sitting in a parking line for more than 10 minutes trying to get into a local fair when, I discovered I was in the wrong lane, and nearly to the gate! My husband waved to the van next to us. The woman driving, who I could see had several children with her, seamed happy to let us pull in front her after we asked if we may. I was so excited to not have to ‘go around and wait' again, I decided to pay for her parking.
After paying, we parked, and entered the ... | Home | About Us | Our Friends | Get Involved | Contact us |  |  |  |