For this Blog, I want you to continue reading aloud. Yes. You heard me. This is that kind of writing that’s best heard and spoken, so that your eyes and your ears form a double tunnel of understanding connecting to your beautiful mind.
Parents and educators speak about the three R’s in education. Reading, writing and Rithmetic. Have you heard of it? See, this is why you are reading this aloud. You get to roll those Rs, Rrrrr! And of course, it’s spelling looks wrong. Did you hear that, another R? The three Rs work because it’s easier to remember in a rapping kind of way. Hope you enjoying the Rs. Sound off!
I’m going to introduce you to another R word: Random. If you’ve stopped reading aloud, now’s a good time to start again. We are a cross cultural, multilingual school. Listen to the word Random. It can sound like rand-aummm. That amazing vibratory chant known by yogis and westerners alike as a sound of the Divine . Or if you Afrikaans speaking you know the word rand is also rand and om is a that speaks to‘gee om’, ‘om-trent’, ‘draai om’. SO as sounds go the word random deconstructed gives us quite a, translatory jive. Stay with me while I introduce another phrase to this dancing word. Using your brilliant imagination give me a drum roll for… RANDOM ACTS OF KINDNESS.
Now this next bit may seem random, but I’m going to invite you to remember a time like your birthday, when everyone who knew about your birthday, wished you a ‘Happy birthday!’
Remember that sleep the night before, the planning, the excitement, the imaginings as you drift off to the lala of dreamland.
And as you open your eyes on your very own new year, you start the day with all sorts and sounds of joy. Like presents, yummy colourful cakes, blowing up balloons, blowing out candles, singing, birthday wishes, choices… Everyone’s wishing you and you feel sooo special. Now that kind of happy birthday is possible because people around you were doing things you love, and giving you what they think you’d love, and you were being celebrated with those you love.
Imagine that feeling being a random happy. I’ll explain. Can you remember a time when you were not expecting anything, and it wasn’t your birthday, and someone surprised you, and made you feel happy?
The word random when you think about it, seems to have no direct cause and effect. No obvious reason as a casual link.
What if you, yes you, were the cause of someone feeling happy for no particular reason except that doing happy, makes happy, causing effect.
So I’m about to challenge you, to get your game on, to level up!
Can you use your power of imagination, your habits of heart and mind, to think of random ways of what will or what can, possibly, make someone, anyone, happy?
Starting here, starting now.
Random acts of Kindness are a beautiful way of showing that you value someone and more importantly, that you value kindness. And kindness makes that warm fuzzy inkling feeling of birthday mornings.
What if you were the person that actively looked for any moment, made any moment, a possibility and potential for that happy happening?
What if you were the person who brought an extra slice of bread, or stayed a little longer to help, or carried someone’s heavy bag, or picked up a paper someone dropped or gave someone’s sad face a compassionate smile. What if you lingered just a little longer to say something kind, to offer your seeing something beautiful that was a little different, what if you were that person who joined that not so popular person sitting alone on the playground? What if you helped someone get an answer right, or encouraged when the answer was wrong, or gave someone a chance to win, for a change, or offer an affi rmation when they did manage in a moment to improve or overcome? What if you simply looked for reasons and moments in your day to activate a happy, belonging and connected heart? What if we practiced ubuntu with a practical seeing of sawubona?
What if words like ‘mankind’ was actually to include all people in remembering that we are all of the same kind, and what makes you happy is a good guess to what could possibly make me happy too. What if that same kind of thinking spread one act at a time, one person at a time, one home or class at a time, one school at a time.
Let’s start here at Schools where I visit.
I challenge us All: parents, educators, learners… to value random acts of kindness like we value one Rand as currency. And while one Rand may not seem like much, when we pay attention to heartmind matters, kindness appreciates and our values are seen. (Yes, playing with currency discourse, of course.) We show interest and we gain interest and the love currency in our school becomes invaluable. We make happy moments by fueling our moral economy one RANDom act of KINDness at a time, while we learn our three Rs. And as learning and evolution goes, we add a fourth R to reinforce what we all need: Rrrreasons to feel good As we learn.
So rise to surprise! Turn the randauummm! Draai iemand se dag om! Activate your own happy to ripple and cascade in and through our corridors. Let’s make this contagious. Keep smiling as you stop reading aloud and go make someone’s day one random act of kindness at a time! Yay!
Fadeela Ally Schmidt
Facilitator, mother, healer and teacher
