Kindness

I'll admit it, I'm a little lost right now. I want to be super happy and blogging every day about happy things. I want to have fabulous photos on every post too, but the fact of the matter is that I'm nursing a injured arm (I fell on my 3rd day back home and hurt it), my house is filthy (which zaps my energy and I can't even clean it because of the arm!), I have not mourned my sister's death (and now that I've put her loss in that little locked "box" in my heart -- how do I get it out so that I can grieve properly? -- maybe I need to go back to therapy) and I'm still tired from all I've been through over the last three months. Heck, I'm tired from all I've been through over the last 10 months. Maybe even longer. It doesn't seem like I've had the time to deal with any of it properly. I've tried to deal with each thing as it came up, but something else came up before I could finish and the first thing would get shoved into the "box" and never brought back out. This is a defence mechanism I learned as a very young child when I was being molested by an uncle by marriage. I'm very good at blocking things. Very good at it. Such is life. Sometimes it just flat sucks.

Life is hard, but it is worth the work it takes to be happy. I should tell you right now, and in no uncertain terms, that I am not unhappy. The arm is getting me a little down because I had lots of plans for when I got home and I am disappointed to have to postpone them. I wanted to super clean my home. I wanted to start and finish several quilts. I had lots of plans! Unfortunately, I can't do them right now. So, on to plan B.

What is plan B? Do I even have a plan B? Well, I didn't until tonight although it started forming a couple of days ago when I read a posting on the blog Necessary Room. Se'lah wants to "build a bridge of love" to celebrate the Dalai Lama's 75th birthday by doing random acts of kindness on Tuesday July 6th, which just happens to be the birthday of which we are speaking. Read her posting here and then look over her blog. Se'lah is a lovely woman and full of warmth. I'll be joining her for her random acts of kindness idea on Tuesday. I love random acts of kindness! They make me feel good. I can only hope they make the folks that I act upon feel as good.

photo taken from picapp. Here is the photo description.
WASHINGTON - FEBRUARY 19: The Dalai Lama participates in a ceremony after recieving the Democracy Service Medal at the Library of Congress on Febru,ary 19, 2010 in Washington, DC. The medal was created by the National Endowment for Democracy and has been presented to a wide range of individuals who have demonstrated through personal commitment, their dedication to the advancement of freedom and human rights. (Photo by Mark Wilson/Getty Images)
Content © 2010 Getty Images All rights reserved.

Then earlier tonight I came across a post in the Bayou Quilts blog when I was catching up on blogs I missed reading while in CA. Her blog posting is titled A Kindness Revolution and is about giving 29 gifts in 29 days. Here is an article about it also. The article and blog posting are about Cami Walker, who at age 33 was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis. She was prescribed the 29 gifts in 29 days by an African medicine woman named Mbali Creazzo to help her through some of her more difficult symptoms. Cami has written a book about her experience -- 29 Gifts looks to be worth the read and I am definitely going to order it after I finish this post.

I went to the book link on Amazon and read all it would let me read about the book. All I can say after doing so is that I am in! I'll do it. I look forward to the challenge of 29 straight days of gifts to others. I won't start this until after Tuesday. I'll blog about it again the day before I start and I'd love for you to join me! I also plan to blog about each gift each day and any benefits I get from the gift I give. Now, I'm going to go check out the 29 gifts website. We'll visit again soon. Take care.