The Joy I've Been Given

Beth from Blue Ridge Blue Collar Girl was awarded and passed along the award for a Community Blogger. This award seeks to celebrate those people "who reach out and make the blogger community a better one.” I'm kinda blushing, so maybe I'll just let you read her post because it touched my heart in a very real way. I put it on the side but I can't figure out how to shrink it so pardon if it looks quite the honker over there, I'll fiddle with it as I go along.

I recently did a bonus assignment with my students that I called "Pay the Good Feelings Forward." We were discussing a unit on customer and patron service, and how to create ourselves as better employees and patrons in a workplace. My bonus assignment involves writing a brief letter of thanks to either a business or Library that has given you excellent service and/or made an impact in your life. My assumption is that so often we are a society of whiners and complainers that really only write somebody when we are pissed or unhappy. I'd like to stress to people to write more about the good that they find.

Have you ever felt respected and appreciated? Be it corporate, waiting tables, Library, business, teaching or what have you......if you feel like you are valued more then likely you are going to go the extra mile again and again. More then likely you are also going to be much more appreciative of others in their workplace situations if you have a measure of self-esteem and happiness. Folks that are happy in their own lives and workplace situations treat others with a greater cheerfulness when they are a patron of an establishment. It's a great big circle my friends, a circle......and not to be too touchy feely on that one but I really hold to this belief.

My assignment awarded points to folks that wrote a gas station manager, a new bookstore owner, a restaurant employee, a customer service representative, a Library and more. Most of them went to the establishment where the wonderful situations/person were employed, so hopefully there were a few more backs patted too. It could be brief, it could be e-mail....but it had to be genuine. The neat thing about letter of good vibes is that when somebody takes the time to write an establishment we usually figure that this vote counts for many more people that didn't take the time to write. It says something to write when you are fueled by appreciation rather then by the fires of anger, about the person and about yourself. Every student that completed the assignment also felt good about what they had done in writing a letter, and good about themselves in some little way.

So Beth did for me what I hope I do for my students. She paid good feeling forward about blogging, writing, self-expression and my attempts to get my creative mojo going on my novel. I'm also realizing that the more that I write about just life, or kids, or me, or random thoughts the more it does seem to create a connection, hence community in an online environment. One of the neatest things I'm enjoying about blogging relationships is that I'm getting to know folks that I might never have the opportunity to meet, and a few that one day hopefully I will as I evolve my life in new directions.

So thanks Beth. You paid it forward and now so shall I.

There is no way I could select every blog that I read, so please don't be offended as I picked only my top three:

Willowluna for Crunchy Life. She's funny, she's crafty, she's real. I like that she gets discussions going on her blog and likes to interact on issues. I wish I could take one of her classes one day because I feel like she's be one of those teachers that just got your juices going. I like that sometimes she's unhappy with the state of the world, but always trying to make it a better place. She's also quite encouraging you know.....especially for the newly crunchified. I never had a sock fetish before reading her blog but now have the yen to try to learn to knit. She is just the coolest Mama ever in making her kids costumes and creating a home and hearth.

MyShell for Color Your World Pink. She's passionate, real, earthy and somehow I feel like one day we may meet. (New camper in the house.....dreams of a cross country trek next year....ya never know!) I think that she's a person that you meet online and somehow really relate to. Somehow our blogs about earth and family appreciation started round about the same time and I've gotten so many good ideas from her. I think we are both evolving as women bloggers and seeking to find a voice in a world that has gone awry, and therefore make it a little better in a small way. She paints, loves a good bev, has a fire fighting earth tree planting hubby and is a crafty Mama. She got me going in realizing that my environmental drive also has to include everyday choices, especially in plastics. She's on a campaign to rid the world of plastic bags.....so let's join her. She is also so very real and so makes me miss the Dead days. Somehow when I read her she is pulling me back into my crunch life ways and how I used to be before I got lost in suburbia.

Bex of Poppy and Mei. I've been sucked into her crafty goodness world as she is an Australian living in Japan teaching her children the Waldorf method way. I've gotten so jazzed by a few of her crafting ideas and we seem to frequent the same online spots. She seems like one of those just darn amazing happy people and I've so digging the cultural exchange. I had no idea what "Oz" (Australia) or LaLa (Daddy) was until I was reading her. I love that I'm reading an Aussie all the way from Japan. It's just unique to say and makes me feel really neat about possibilities of cultural exchanges on the Internet. I'd love to send her a package for Christmas of weird stuff from Illinois and get a kimono wearing acorn person in exchange.


So happy blogging folks, and may we all pay the good feelings forward.