Random Acts of Kindness: 365 Days of Good Deeds, Inspired Ideas and Acts of Goodness

By Brenda Knight and Becca Anderson

Build a Better World with Random Acts of Kindness and Good Deeds

Winner of the Living Now Book Award, Gold – Evergreen, World Peace

#1 Bestseller: Previous editions of Random Acts of Kindness have sold over one million copies

Celebrate National Random Acts of Kindness Week in February. Perform good deeds of compassion and consideration toward others.

The Random Acts of Kindness movement is born. In 1995, a small group of people at Conari Press came together around the idea that small gestures and simple acts can make a difference in people's lives. Thus, Random Acts of Kindness was born. But they had no idea how big this little idea would become.

Make a difference in the world. This good-humored guide to being the change you want to see in the world is filled with suggestions for making a real difference, in ways both large and small. From improving someone’s life with just one penny to ensuring all children are well fed, the day-by-day positive proposals of Random Acts of Kindness combine inspiration with action. Despite the hurly-burly of our busy lives, we can all make a beneficial impact on the environment, throughout out local community, and within our own hearts. This book of inspired ideas and good deeds conveys how “the power of one”―that is, you―can make a better world, starting today!

Sometimes the smallest gesture makes the biggest difference. This little book shows how to start―with the small, with the particular, with the individual―in order to make a difference in the world.

Random Acts of Kindness features:

• True stories about acts of kindness and generosity of spirit
• Suggestions for living more compassionately
• Inspirational quotes to get you started

Fans of books such as Chicken Soup for the Soul, A Pebble for Your Thoughts, I've Been Thinking…, or You Can Do All Things will love the encouraging, inspirational stories in this new Random Acts of Kindness edition.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Mango
• Release date: Dec 22, 2020
• ISBN: 9781642506624

Brenda Knight

Brenda Knight began her career at HarperCollins, working with luminaries Paolo Coelho, Marianne Williamson, and His Holiness the Dalai Lama. Knight was awarded IndieFab’s Publisher of the Year in 2015 at the ALA, American Library Association. Knight is the creator of Badass Affirmations series as well as the author of Random Acts of Kindness, The Grateful Table and Women of the Beat Generation, which won an American Book Award. Knight is publisher at Mango Publishing. She teaches at the San Francisco Writers Conference and Writing for Change and serves as President Emeritus of the Women’s National Book Association, San Francisco Chapter. Brenda Knight resides in the SF Bay Area. She blogs about acts of kindness at: lowerhaightholler.blogspot.com.

Book preview

Foreword:

Kindness Really Does Rock

Kindness is love made visible, and the world has never needed it more. My path to contributing to a kinder world was the beach on Cape Cod. I decided to turn off the negativity of the morning news and take daily morning walks instead. I was at a turning point in my life, after leaving the busy and frenetic life of a retailer. What was coming next for me? I was open, albeit nervously so. The morning walks made an immediate difference in my quality of life, and I decided to paint uplifting messages on rocks and leave them where somebody who might need some positivity would see them. To my great surprise, the response was almost immediate. My painted pebbles were making an impact. And so it grew from one Kindness Rock to many across the globe. These rocks have helped grieving parents, cancer patients, adults dealing with anxiety and depression, kids struggling with a scary world, and so many people who both give and receive inspiration.

I have always loved the Random Acts of Kindness movement, and my favorite aspect of it is that these acts of goodness are often completely anonymous and done with no expectation of getting anything in return. These acts can be large and small, from paying for coffee for the exhausted single mom behind you at Starbucks, to volunteering at the local church soup kitchen, to painting a loving message on a rock and leaving it for someone who really needs it. Random Acts of Kindness actively make the world a more loving, and less painful place. What we learn from being a good in the world is that through helping others, we can find healing within ourselves.

Join the kindness revolution!

Megan Murphy

Founder of The Kindness Rocks Foundation

Introduction:

Living from the Heart

We don’t care what anyone else says. These are awful times. Anxiety and despair swirl around in our minds like discarded newspapers with headlines that tell us to remain on continual alert, indefinitely. Our souls are leaking. We are in a recession, and we are receding. We are not moving toward anything. We are receding away. Away from what terrifies us. Away from disease and illness, from random acts of violence and human rights abuse, from poverty and homelessness. We are both clutching each other and moving away at the same time.

In a time when so many people feel powerless and invisible, when there are so many miserable things that happen to so many wonderful people, this little book you hold is more needed than ever.

While there are moments when we must stomp our feet in indignation and make room for the expression of our outrage, we must also create space in your life for the expression of gratitude, because it is possible to surpass the suffering in the world by adding to the joy. Once you begin to perform and acknowledge random acts of kindness, you can no longer believe that what you do does not matter.

Think about the quarantined Italians who sang and danced together from their balconies during the first few months of the pandemic, holding signs bearing comforting words such as, Come on guys, everything is going to be all right. Or think about the people in Spain, Ireland, Portugal, and France who coordinated times to applaud healthcare workers who were saving lives on the front lines. Consider the volunteers in Iran who turned shuttered mosques into makeshift spaces to sew face masks and prepare food packages for those in need. Turn your attention to the two young New York City residents who created a network of over 1,300 volunteers in just seventy-two hours in order to deliver food and medicine to elderly people in New York and New Jersey. And think about the artists and writers who offered free virtual concerts and readings to take our minds off of our worries.

What has sustained your soul? What has inspired you to hold on when all else was pulling you over a cliff? You are, we all are, the culmination of an infinite number of improbable gifts from myriad nameless sources.

And you do make a difference.

For this book, we have thought about the incredibly rich variety of ways that kindness manifests itself in the world and the effects such manifestations can have. We turned to the inspirational words of the many writers and spiritual leaders who have championed kindness in their lives and used their quotes to focus in on its wealth of nuances. We’ve included stories that show how that particular aspect of kindness is played out within the context of an individual’s life and a meditation focal point for each week.

As the pages unfolded, we began to see that the practice of kindness has two dimensions: one is vertical, in which we deepen our connection to ourselves; the other is horizontal, in which we reach out to connect to others. Together, they create a sphere, the symbol of wholeness. Both are limitless, for there is no end to how deep or how wide you can go. But you can’t have one without the other, for to serve others is to bring your wholeness—including your woundedness and your shadow—to the wholeness in others and in life.

It is our fervent hope that these experiences will assist us all to better see and respond to the opportunities we are given to bring more kindness into our lives—and into those of all with whom we share this fragile earthly home.

Brenda Knight and Becca Anderson

Editors at Conari Press

January: Start with You

I’ve decided to try to be a better person… But not right away, of course… Maybe a few days from now.

—Sally to Charlie Brown in a Peanuts cartoon

So many of us say we’re trying—trying to be more considerate of others, to take time for ourselves, to find the time to make a difference in the world—but try as we might, we never really get around to it. That’s because saying we’re trying can be a great escape from doing. We want to excuse ourselves for not doing, and we may want to avoid looking at the real reasons that have kept us from following through.

Week 1: Resolve to Be a Force for Good in the World

Do or do not. There is no try.

—Yoda, a Jedi Master, in The Empire Strikes Back

Most of us carry around an image of ourselves as we would like to be—more generous, patient, and reliable. But what we want to be means nothing until we stop intending and start acting.

Give up trying. Next time you hear yourself saying, I’m trying, take a moment to look at what is standing in your way of