Why Random Acts Of Kindness Make You Feel Good

Yesterday, while I was shopping in our little town (one supermarket, two butchers, one newsagent and so forth) I spotted a banknote of large denomination lying on the footpath outside one of the butcher's shops. At first, I thought it was one of those fake trick notes that someone had stuck down on the footpath to watch as people tried to pick it up in order to have a laugh at someone else's expense. But when I bent to pick it up it was exactly what it seemed - a $100 note. There was no-one in the street at all, just me, my grand-daughter and a $100 note. I pondered what to do, knowing that if I'd lost that amount of cash, I'd be pretty devastated...........and decided that I needed to find it's owner if I possibly could. I dropped my grand-daugher off at the hairdresser, raced home to write a sign to put in the butcher's window, then dashed back to stick it up.

When I asked the lad in the shop if it would be OK, he said there had been a man searching high and low for the dropped note, but there seemed to be no sign of him any longer. We went out into the street and the butcher spotted the man disappearing into the newsagent's and pointed him out. I ran in there and went up to the fellow and just asked him if he'd lost some cash. "Yeah", he said, "A hundred dollars. It was my parents money - I've just come into town to buy their groceries. Now I don't know what I'm going to do". He looked really dejected and ill able to afford the loss of $100, so it gave me a really good feeling to be able to tell him that I'd found it and to give it back to him. His gratitude was almost overwhelming.............I believe he thought he would never see that money again.

So acts like this make you feel very good inside because you know you have helped a stranger out of a pickle and because it's the right thing to do. I'm a great believer in random acts of kindness - I do it quite often just because.

I hope he pays it forward.

Don't forget to enter my giveaway - you'll find it in the 3rd August post - I'll be drawing it on August 17th.