The Goal Really Isn’t 1,000,000 Acts of Kindness

I’ve been thinking:

The Kindness Challenge January 2012 has just begun. But on Feb. 1, 2012, when the Challenge has ended, how will we know if it was a success? What measure will we use?

It’s easy to think,

“Well, the goal was to have one million acts of kindness performed and logged by people around the world during January, 2012. Did we make it?” or

“How many people liked us on facebook?”

"How many blog followers, or twitter followers did we have?"

But none of those are the REAL goal or measure of success.

What's the REAL goal of the Challenge?

The real goal, or question, will be:

• Did we create awareness of the power of kindness?
• Did we build momentum that shifted the world and changed people’s lives?
• Did we make a difference in the world?

Oh sure, it will be fun for all of us to watch the counter as people log in their acts. And to read everyone’s stories about sharing kindness. But how will we really know if we—all of us together—have made a difference?

How will we know if we've made a difference?

That, my friends, will come from each of us. Each time one of us lets someone go in front of us in the grocery line. Or strikes up a friendly conversation with someone at the bus stop. Or offers to help a colleague meet a deadline—we'll have a chance to "make a difference" or "change someone's life."

As you take up the challenge of spreading kindness this month, I invite you to become more aware -- not of how great you feel when you do kindness for another (although it DOES feel wonderful) but of the recipient, how your act of kindness might really affect him or her. There will be that connection - it may be a split second - but there will be that connection between 2 human beings and you'll know you've made a difference. And the fact that your attention is over there on THEM and and how THEY feel, increases the power of your gift all the more.

30 Acts in 30 Days Creates a New Habit

One more idea - while the Kindness Challenge is about all of us pooling our acts of kindness to build awareness and momentum, you can also use this as a personal goal for the New Year. Many people take on the goal of doing 60 acts of kindness in 60 days for their 60th birthday. Or 365 acts of kindness - 1 per day - for a year.

Just doing one act per day for the month of January is an easy goal to achieve and it's all experts say you need to create a new habit - a habit guaranteed to change YOUR life.