It's also been the first full week of the Kindness Advent Calendar that I've been taking part in.
This was actually trickier than I thought - it probably depends on what area you live in also, but I figured being in Chichester, people are generally quite friendly and welcoming. Don't get me wrong, they are - but what this kindness act made me realise over the course of the day is how many people just shuffle along with their heads down - either staring down at their phone or generally just looking towards the floor. And of course, yes I realised that I do this myself too, all the time.
So it was difficult to make eye contact with people, let alone break a smile at them! Then even when you do make eye contact with people, the immediate reaction/reflex seems to be to look away. It was quite a sad realisation really. But hey, something to keep trying I think. I'm definitely going to try and stop walking along with my head in my phone all the time!
Day 6: Offer to run an errand for someone who needs help
This was another bit of a fail I'm afraid, as I couldn't think of anyone I was due to be in contact with that day who might need help. A bit of a lame excuse I know, but I thought it might seem a little odd to just start randomly asking people at work if they needed anything doing. As I was going into town at lunchtime, I did ask those around me if they needed anything, but they said no.
One reason I was going into town though was to drop off a bag of donations so I counted that as my kindness act for the day instead :-)
Day 7: Sign up to the organ donor register
Now, in my head, I had this down as something that I was unsuccessful in doing before for some reason, with the intention of looking into it again one day. Which of course I never got around to doing. So imagine my surprise when I went onto the NHS Organ Donation website and got myself registered in the space of two minutes!
Heh?
As I thought about it more, I remembered that what I had previously tried to register for was to be a bone marrow transplant donor - which I couldn't because I'm not a blood donor. And I'm not a blood donor because I'm under the weight limit. Doh. I have actually been putting on weight over the last couple of years though, so I reckon I will hit the required weight limit soon, yay! (My mother did warn me that my metabolism would drop once I hit 30!)
Day 8: Text, tweet or email a compliment to three people
I absolutely loved this one. It was a nice exercise to just think of people and think of a nice thing to say about them. I ended up sending way more than three, but here are a few of the ones I sent:
Sent to a friend who was having a job interview that day...
Sent to a friend who has had a really rough year...
Sent to a Whatsapp group with two friends, where the conversation then proceeded to go into a series of accent-related replies! (Yes we can write in our special accents as well as speak in them..!)
Day 9: Write a positive message on a post-it and put it on your work or a public mirror
I might have got a little carried away with this one. I work in a big office so decided to write not just one positive message, but six of them (see top of post)! I stuck them up in all the toilets around the building (just the ladies ones, by the way, as I think going into the lads ones might have been taking it a bit too far). This was my favourite one:
Day 10: Give someone your full attention - put down your phone and really listen
I actually swapped days 10 and 11 around, and did this one today, because yesterday I didn't have plans to see anyone. Today I went out for a lovely festive lunch with my girlfriends at The Kennels in Chichester. We are always in contact via Whatsapp and stuff anyway but we hadn't physically met up for about a month. It was so nice to just have a relaxing sit down meal and catch up properly with everyone. No-one had their phones out, no-one was fussed about having to leave at a certain time - it felt like we were all just in the moment, enjoying each other's company.
Day 11: Be kind to yourself - go outside for a soul-soothing stroll in nature
So this one I actually did yesterday. I had a rare day off for myself, which was a blessing in itself and earlier in the week, I had all these things I had planned to 'get done' during my 'free day'. As this day approached and I looked at the 'be kind to yourself' act, I realised that filling up a day to 'get stuff done' probably isn't a healthy approach to having a free day. Sometimes you need to just be free! So I decided to hop on my bike and just take a random cycle around. Which is something that I never do, because I solely use my bike to get from A to B (I don't drive).
I cycled over to Centurion Way which is long stretch of a disused railway path. It's about 3 miles (the bit I did anyway) and is a nice, flat path, where you get to whizz through the Sussex countryside and view the landscape. It's really peaceful down there. At first it felt really odd just cycling down there for 'no reason', but this feeling was fast overtaken by a sense of freeness and calm. Sounds a little cheesy I know, but it did feel really good just to be out there cycling through the countryside, for no other reason than to just be there.
Definitely need to keep doing more things like this - bring on week 3!
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