A month of giving can truly change your life! Just ask Cami Walker, or one of the many members who have experienced the joys of mindful giving. Be sure to journal and share your 29 Days of Giving in this forum. Tell us about your giving, your receiving, and how giving makes you feel. Tell us what your gifts mean to you, the impact on the recipients and how the challenge impacts your life over the next 29 days. Share the change with the Community to inspire and support others, a gift in itself. Thank you for accepting the challenge. We look forward to sharing your experience!
Day 1: I finished reading Cami's book a couple weeks ago and for some reason have been putting off getting started on my gift giving. I'm not sure what my delay was, but I had decided August was a good time to restart some healthier habits (healthy food choices, fitness, personal development) that I had kind of been slacking on lately and the 29 gifts would add another element to my mission. My first gift was to watch a friend's dog while he goes on vacation. This may not seem like much of a gift, but I really didn't want to, and when I say I didn't want to I dreaded the day he brought her over from the second I said I would do it. I already have a new puppy (3 months, almost 20 pounds) and 4 cats, I wasn't sure how any of them would get along with an older (12 years) chihuahua that is an only pet and is very seldom around other animals. My friend had checked on boarding and it was going to cost him over $200 for the time he would be gone. By agreeing to watch his dog, I not only saved him some money, but when he picked her up today she was jumping and playing with my puppy acting like a puppy herself. He said he very seldom sees her so active. I feel like not only did I help him out with not having to pay for boarding, I also helped her out by getting her up and active and acting like a puppy herself even if just for a little while. Looking forward to what the next 28 days bring.
Today is my 1st day of the 29-day giving challenge and I'm very excited. I just downloaded the additional documents provided by the website and am printing my journal as I type. To kick off my challenge, I started by giving to a new father in need of baby items to care for his newborn son who's mother died suddenly and tragically. I don't know him personally, as he is the neighbor of a friend of my mother-in-law however I heard his story and am excited to help both he and his new son on their journey. I decided since he doesn't know me anyway, that I would send him some baby items anonymously through Amazon as a gift, removing any trace of my information as the sender. I don't want him to feel bad or weird about accepting these items from a stranger. Maybe he wouldn't, but it made me feel better to send them anonymously :)
I started two days ago but up to now I do not know why I could not access the website of 29 Gifts! Anyway, here is my entry in my journal: Today, I started the 29 Gift-giving Challenge. Although I do not like journalling, I am also taking it as a challenge. One very important thing I did was to share this decision with all my friends in relatives in my e-mail directory as well as in my Messenger account. I was very delighted with their feedback. Those who replied believed it was a good idea/challenge. Some were bold enough to meet the challenge head-on! I am so glad! Here is what I wrote (quite long!): Some years ago, my daughter Pizza gave me a book which interested me but because of the thousand and one involvement I have in our business, in our parish, in our community, not to mention the family and clan activities of both sides, I did not have the opportunity to finish the book. In fact, I was able to read only the first few chapters and had to lay it aside. One of the good things that happened during this lockdown, I was able to finish books I wanted to read but did not have the time. So, I selected the books I always wanted to read and this happened to be the third book I have finished reading this pandemic days!
The title of the book is '29 Gifts' by Cami Walker. Her story goes this way: "One month after her wedding day, thirty-three-year-old Cami Walker was diagnosed with multiple sclerosis, and the life she knew changed forever. Cami was soon in and out of L.A.’s emergency rooms with alarming frequency as she battled the neurological condition that left her barely able to walk and put enormous stress on her marriage. Each day brought new negative thoughts: "I’m going to end up in a wheelchair... My life is over. Why did this have to happen to me?"
Then, as a remedy for her condition, Cami received an uncommon prescription from a friend, an African medicine woman named Mbali Creazzo. The prescription was to give away 29 gifts in 29 days. “By giving,” Mbali told her, “you are focusing on what you have to offer others, inviting more abundance into your life.” The gifts, she said, could be anything, but their giving had to be both authentic and mindful. At least one gift needed to be something she felt was scarce in her life. There is one catch though: once you fail to give in one day, you have to start from Day 1 all over again! Also, journaling is a requirement!
Cami was amazed by what unfolded during her month-long journey...The book invites readers to take on the challenge and how the journey could change one's life. The invitation further says, "Join us in the journey to change your world and in turn change the entire world."
After much thought, I decided to take on the challenge starting today. I always believe that if we want to leave a legacy of a better world for our children and grandchildren, we have to do something! What better way than to do an act of kindness by giving away something everyday for 29 days? I am not thinking of something grandiose to give everyday! It can be as grand as a gift, a letter, a P50 donation, a plant or even just a flower, or as simple as a handshake, an acknowledgment, a smile, a wish, a cup of coffee, a phone call, a text, or what have you! Hopefully, this could have a ripple effect not only to my family but also to my friends and acquaintances. Could you just imagine if everyone does a single act of kindness everyday and how this will contribute to a better world, especially in this time of pandemic when there is so much negativity, helplessness and hopelessness?
The 29 Gift-giving Challenge has a website and has grown by leaps and bounds. I invite you to this link to read more about the movement as well as be inspired by how this challenge has inspired them and how their lives changed because of it. Please click Give one thing away, each day, for 29 days - 29Gifts.org I am also ambitious! Just like Cami, I am hoping that since the gift-giving can become a habit, I can continue doing it beyond the 29 days and sana everyday of my remaining life! Let's see!
Will you rise up to the challenge?
All the best. Keep safe and healthy! - thelma
On this very first day, I made a phone call to a long time friend Jose from my first job days whom I have not gotten in touch for almost a year now! We exchanged pleasantries and updated each other. At the end, I promised her I would pray for her niece Jasmin who is sick of cancer. Ended the day very happy that I accepted the 29 Gift-giving Challenge! - thelma
I am on Day 23 of my 29-Day Challenge. I began the book in a place of life that was less than satisfactory. I was feeling sorry for myself about a difficult decision I had to make recently. It hurt every day, and I would dive and wallow in my sadness. I wasn't putting in much effort to my house or the people around me. During the first couple weeks, negative thoughts still crowded my mind about my life. I questioned whether I would get much out of the giving. Then, somewhere around Day 17, I started to set an intention for my giving. Writing down an intention. I now see what the challenge has done for me.
Every day, I feel more connection and surrender with all that is around me. I have re-embraced my spirituality. My book, I have been writing for some time, is almost done and ready to be submitted to publishers. I am eternally grateful. I know the challenge helped me pick myself back up and realize how much I do have to offer the world. It helped me into action - which is the real creator of change. Although negative thoughts still crowd my mind, I feel so much more confident about myself and my life.
Thank you for this book, Cami. Thank you for the wisdom, Mbali.
Day four: I did what I could around the house for my partner who was on a streak of working seven days straight this week. Day five: I reached out to my parents. Both of these acts were emotionally fraught, as my relationships with both my partner and my parents are strained right now. I am happy I gave, and I actually was able to release a lot of emotions regarding my partner that I had been carrying as I helped him out, but my reaching out to my parents was a dead-end. Some giving will be easier than others, these weren't the easy days.
Day three: I gave to myself today. My work/school/side hustle load is getting intense and changing drastically this month. Living a fairly isolated life to begin with, the blessing of working from home can feel like a curse some days and my depression has let me make a lot of excuses for barely scraping by financially and not working at the caliber I know I can. Today I started my new 5 am routine - I did time blocking and tweaked this schedule until everything fit comfortably into a M-F work week. I almost never stick to a schedule and wind up scrambling on the weekends. But today I got up when the alarm went off and stuck to all the time chunks. I meditated for the first time in years, worked out, showered, walked my dog twice, and am currently waiting on the oven because I even cooked a healthy meal for dinner. Tonight I intend to meditate again before bed, but for now I still have a few hours left to study and maybe relax with a little TV. It wasn't perfect, but I know I will get more and more done as I get used to this. I am so proud of myself for stepping up for myself, and I hope to take that gift of those feelings I gave to myself and carry it into the next few days and weeks until this lifestyle change becomes my new normal.
Hello! I just began the giving journey yesterday, given that February is my birthday month, and I am typically very self absorbed during this time. So far, I've given a couple new packs of socks to a crises worker who gives necessities to those in need as well as sticky notes to my mom who needed some. Even more powerful I think are a couple of emotional things I've given the past two days. First, I gave myself permission to move on from a toxic relationship, and second, I forgave someone without them needing to ask for forgiveness. I am grateful to have this community to be able to discuss and read inspiring stories from others.
Day two: Today is the last day before payday, I have $1.27 left after bills. As someone who gets paid per page as a transcriptionist, this feeds my money scarcity mindset when dollars equal pages. I know I get paid tomorrow, so I donated $1 to TeamTrees.org, a charity I support and one that I know I can donate just $1 to. As i pulled out my wallet to get my debit card, imagine my surprise when I found $2 in cash (I rare carry cash, and though I paid with cash last week, I swore I spent it all). Funny, releasing that only dollar I thought I had and I found two. I gave the $2 to my partner who pays in cash for his meals at work. It's not much, but with his discount, that's almost half his lunch today.
Day one: I work independently from home and have devised a spreadsheet to help me document my work. I decided today to share that with my fellow remote workers through our community forum. At first I didn't know if the gift felt adequate, but I know it's what I had to offer today. An hour later I connected with a fellow co-worker who I had not interacted with before and she checked out my profile bio, realized I'm starting a blog and said that if I needed any help she was willing to mentor me. In turn I went to her website and found out we had quite a lot in common. if I hadn't shared that spreadsheet, I probably never would have interacted with her and now I have somebody excited for me to succeed and as my first follower to my new blog!
Hi everyone - just finished the 29 gifts audiobook while on a bit of search for some self development and was immediately inspired by the 29 gifts giving concept. Although I have a great income from a career I have worked very hard to achieve, I struggle to give to others which after much reflection is the result of having been raised by a single mother that struggled to provide. I starting working at age 13 to pay for those things that my mother was unable to provide. I am looking forward to starting this challenge whole heartedly!
Day 1 - after hearing Cami talk about giving to Kiva I decided to check that out. I came across a single mother of 6 and rice farmer in the Philippines trying to purchase a sanitary toilet for her family in the amount of $200. She needed $50 to achieve her goal, which I contributed.
A toilet which I take for granted on a daily basis and can’t imagine not having and helping a single mom made me feel compelled and happy to have helped fulfill this desire for her family. I feel grateful to live in a house where we have running water and multiple bathroom. I hope this brings this family lots of happiness.
