Tales of the Ordinary Days

Day 13 | 30 Days of Writing It is official. I won! I finished the Old Chicago mini-Oktoberfest-tour and won the coveted sweatshirt.  I have been eying this treasure ever since the mini-tour was announced on 9/1. Old Chicago gave me twenty-five days to complete the tour, which entailed drinking/eating twelve items off of their exclusive Oktoberfest menu. No doubling items for credit and only four credits allowed per day. Game on! The minute I saw it, I knew I had to win it. As I explained to Garrett on our first night out, post-tour-announcement, that only beer and pizza sounded good to me, Garrett was suspect. And then when we arrived at OC and I only allowed him to order from twelve choices (Oktoberfest menu), he knew I was up to something. "They've got you hooked on 'winning a prize', don't they? Come on, what is it?" I quickly pointed out the sweatshirt on display. "Garrett, I REALLY want that sweatshirt. And this is totally doa...

A couple of days ago we had a team meeting at work. The main topic centered around serving our patients and what good service really meant. My heart tugged at the core theme of our conversation, kindness. Real, authentic, daily acts of kindness. Stories were told on both the receiving and giving of good service. All included a genuine act of goodwill to serve another. With purity of motive in simply wanting to care for another, an act of kindness cannot be measured in the size of the deed. The smallest actions can produce the largest rewards to the recipient. I shared a story of kindness given to a client in my prior life that later blossomed into a big business opportunity for me. My original act had no motive, but resulted in an unexpected gift back many years later. As others shared stories of good service and the importance of authenticity in our actions, my head swirled with my own receipt of small acts of kindness over my lifetime. These acts resonated with me and my own...