From time to time, the ladies and gents who write for the Silicon Valley Moms Group participate in a virtual book club. We all read the same book and share our thoughts on our personal blogs. I have been so overwhelmed with work and life, I skipped the past several books. But this month’s book selection was too intriguing to pass up. We read a book called “Do One Nice Thing” by Debbie Tenzer.
The concept of the book is quite simple: it offers more than a hundred easy ideas to show kindness to other people. The ideas range from donating baseball tickets to the Veterans Administration to smiling at everyone you pass on the sidewalk. Reading the book was a good exercise in self-reflection: Am I a nice person? Do I do nice things? Most importantly, am I teaching my daughter to be a nice person?
I grew up in a household that had one simple rule: if you can’t say anything nice, don’t say anything at all. (And I guarantee unkind words resulted in big trouble, especially if I was talking to my sisters!) More importantly, I grew up in a Midwestern community that was just that… a community. We treated each other with respect, kindness and generosity each and every day. If a neighbor had a baby, the neighborhood would fill her refrigerator with casseroles and lasagnas. When our roof needed to be re-shingled, my dad’s buddies on the street spent an entire Saturday helping him. When the local downtown flooded after days and days of rainfall, the high school seniors filled and hauled sand-bags to help save the family-owned businesses.
Random acts of kindness, and making time to help others in need, fueled our community. It was who I was raised to be.
Sadly, reading this book made me realize that I have lost some of the kindness and generosity that is so important to me. I am so focused on getting through my days, so set on surviving the rat-race, I have forgotten to take time to care for others. Oh sure, I still make the goulash for the new mommy across the street and I gave my daughter’s stroller to a friend who was strapped for cash. But those things are done when they are convenient for me… not necessarily when they are needed most.
I already have working-mom guilt, always worrying about taking care of my family. But I have had a wake-up call that I need to look beyond my four walls and care for the people who need it… when they need it.
And not just when it’s convenient for me.
– LTV Mom
If you want to explore other thoughts and opinions on being nice, please follow the dialogue on the New Jersey Moms Blog.
Just trying to squeeze in some television between mothering, working and crashing.
