Be A Rainbow 🌈
Author: Megan Natoli, Challenge America Program Director
Research shows that practicing kindness, compassion, and empathy for others as well as for yourself can increase happiness by promoting a sense of belonging and improving confidence.
In the Challenge America community, we see amazing acts of kindness every single day and that is what makes our community such a special, safe space.
Today, I would like to share a short story with you all about a random act of kindness that was very meaningful to me in a vulnerable time.
In September of 2020, I was hospitalized for a month after having life threatening complications from a surgery. The hospital was eleven hours away from my home and at the time, no visitors were allowed due to COVID restrictions.
I truly felt like I was in what I call “the upside down”.
I will never forget the Physical Therapist who visited me each day and told me stories while encouraging me to try and walk around the halls. This person also put cranberry juice in the freezer for me each day so that I could enjoy a slushie in the evening when I needed a little joy the most. If I wasn’t in my room when they came by, they would leave notes telling me to ask my nurses to check the freezer for the cranberry juice later that day.
During that time, this act of kindness held extra weight for me because I was in a very vulnerable place. The cranberry juice slushies brought a little joy to dark days and became a light in “the upside down”. I would even go as far as saying that because they were so joyful for me in a dark time, they also tasted better.
Today, I reflect on how a little kindness and compassion felt life changing to me during a hard time and how we can’t possibly know what others are going through all the time.
But if there is one thing I do know…it’s that a little kindness and compassion can go a long way and can really matter to the person on the other side.
Today and every day, I hope to be like that Physical Therapist, spreading kindness like confetti 🎊and sunshine 🌦️wherever I go.
