Who will you spoil on your birthday?

If your birth signals your opportunity to affect the world, why aren’t birth-days more about celebrating that fact instead of serving ourselves cake?

With inspiration from Rebecca Currey & her friends, we wanted to do something different for a recent 24th birthday.  24 “Random Acts of Kindness”, one done for every year of life. What were the random good deeds, ye ask?

Well, first, we created a poll on Reddit asking for public nominations of “kind things to do around town” (public list here).

We then met at my place as a “staging area”, to split up into teams, arrange purchases, write encouragement notes, get some shovels together, etc.

It was a blast, as it included old friends and newfound friends working towards a common goal.  Here’s the list:

1)    handed out dryer tokens at the laundromat on Fulton
2)    paid for a customer at Taco Bell
3)    paid for the car behind us at Wendy’s.  (The manager was so taken aback by this, he manually added a 50% discount for the next order to chip in as well)
4)    Gave out gallons of hot chocolate out at Rosa Parks Circle

5)    Placed witty notes of motivation on car windshields (esp. those w/ parking tickets)
6)    Gave random strangers “Saturday Hugs”
7)    Gave home-baked pumpkin oatmeal cookies to people on Division

8)    Helped a stranger pay for his gas at Shell
9)    Gave a bag of cans to a collector
10)    Returned shopping carts at Family Fare
11)    Helped a family at Goodwill pay for their purchases
12)    Donated clothes, a Bible, and a football to Goodwill
13)    Took pictures with Lucas & John and printed copies out for them

14)    Gave two bottles of bubbles to a young girl
15)    Picked up trash around family fare
16)    Gave flowers to a series of 3 hospital patients we didn’t know at Mary Free Bed

17)    Bought bus passes for a woman needing them
18)    Huddled and prayed for a grandmother’s lost dog.  He came back the next day!
19)    Handed out nutritious granola bars!
20)    Filled expired parking meters (once in front of the cops!)
21)    Heard stories from several retirees at Clark Retirement Center
22)    Connected a tech friend of ours who donated a laptop to a woman who had lost her job and had no computer to use at home. (yeah, intense!)

Agh, so we didn’t quite hit 24.  However, we thought of it this way; instead of asking, “Did we ‘hit’ 24 random acts of kindness?”, we instead asked, “Did we make the hour, day, or week of 24 different people?”  We found that to be the better question, and the answer to be most assuredly, “Yes.”

If you decide to do something similar for your birthday this year, or for a friend, and need some tips or want to share your experience, contact us!  Have fun out there.

For I was hungry and you gave me something to eat, I was thirsty and you gave me something to drink, I was a stranger and you invited me in.