Recently, the Canadian airline Westjet launched a campaign (the “Caring Comes Home” campaign) whereby their employees undertake random acts of kindness. The campaign was noticed by the media just recently (I read about it on Tuesday’s Metro Vancouver) but it seems to have had very little fanfare. That’s too bad, since numerous people I have talked to think of Vancouver as a non-caring city. It would seem to me as though this campaign could (and should) be taken up by Vancouverites.

I do appreciate random acts of kindness like putting money on people’s parking meters, carrying grocery bags for elderly people, etc. But I have to admit, (and yes, you are welcome to disagree with me on this) that I would prefer other types of random acts of kindness such as the one mentioned in a recent “What’s On Your Mind” comment. The author of the comment praised a woman who was standing in the same Timmy’s line with him. This woman was approached by a person off the street asking for money, and she bought said person a meal and a coffee.

A few months back I complained that, in one of my attempts to be kind to a woman I saw shedding tears, she had snubbed me quite adamantly (by the way, this is one of the posts that WordPress didn’t import from Blogger). Mitch commented that he had undertaken a few good deeds and each one of those was appreciated. He even wrote a full post about it. And to be honest, I was just upset at the fact that I had had one small good deed not being appreciated, when I’ve undertaken lots of other well-intentioned actions whose recipients have been extremely grateful to me.

I think that this chain of good deeds should be year-long, and I also think that Good Samaritans should focus on the local problems and local issues. So you bump into a homeless person… maybe offer to buy them a warm meal? Someone needs your help and you’re up to your eyeballs in work? Take a few minutes at least to listen to their issues. I don’t know, there are lots of things we can do.

The website HelpOthers.org offers a few suggestions:

Gift of service: donate to a cause, as a holiday gift for your best friend.
Gift of affection: be generous with hugs, kisses and pats on the back.
Gift of laughter: clip cartoons, share funny stories.
Gift of a written note: send a ‘thank you’ note, write a letter to an old friend.
Gift of a compliment: a simple ‘you look great today’, a sincere ‘thank you for a wonderful meal’.
Gift of listening: no interrupting, no daydreaming, no responding, just listening.
Gift of solitude: spend some time in silence, help others spend some time in silence.[From the HelpOthers.org website]

I just wish this city had a year-long “Random Acts of Kindness” campaign… *sigh* So, if you can, and if you want, take a minute to execute a random act of kindness. And if you feel like sharing what you did, I’d love to hear from you. My contact information is in the About page.