What question would you liked to be asked each day?

Have you done anything today that has made a positive impact? 


This question could be applied to so many things -- I think it's a great question.  It could be inquiring whether or not you have had a positive impact on the environment, on your neighborhood, on your relationships, on the person who rang up your morning cup of coffee or who cut you off in traffic, on your health, or on your own spirituality. 

For Christmas last year I purchased a small, handmade journal for each member of my family, then painstakingly wrote in calligraphy this title, "Good, Small Things," and this quote from Mother Theresa:  "In this life we cannot do great things.  We can only do small things with great love."     I wrapped each journal in handmade paper and presented the gifts to them with the following story:

A few years ago, I worked with a woman who had a little boy named Kendall.  He was about three years old, and every time I saw him, he would climb up on my lap and give me a great big hug.  As it got closer to Christmas, Karen confided in me that her family was really struggling financially and she was afraid that she and her husband wouldn't have enough money to get Kendall anything for Christmas.  That evening I stopped at a toy store on my way home from work and bought the biggest yellow dump truck they had on the shelf and the biggest red bow I could find, and labeled it:  "To Kendall from Santa."  Just before midnight on Christmas Eve I drove to Karen's apartment, slipped quietly up the stairs, set the gift down outside her door, rang the bell and ran back to the stairwell, where I peeked back around the corner to make sure they answered the door.  I saw Karen's husband open the door, look around in puzzlement, then look down at the toy on the doormat.  I slipped away down the stairs, with joy in my heart because I knew I had just made one very deserving little boy happy, and I also knew that his parents had just had a little of their faith in humankind restored.

The journals I gave my family are journals in which they write down anything they do that makes a positive impact.  They can open their journals whenever they need a reminder of who they are -- good people, worthy of love and worthy of the kindness of others.