This morning I actually googled how to show gratitude. I'm desperate. I can't tell you how much this stresses me out some days. I keep a list on my phone of people I need to thank and at the end of the day I have yet to send a thank you card or figured out how to go about showing my appreciation. So in my Google search I came across a plethora of lists and ways to do so, but none of them really fits the bill as far as my situation goes. I don't know how to go about it the right way. So the best thing I can think of is using this blog. I know I'm going to forget people and things that people have done for me, but I'm going to try my best. I'm not going to give names because throughout this journey I have learned that people are not looking for thanks. But I do want to share with you some of the simple and grand gestures that people have bestowed upon me.
So instead of using one of the Google lists on how to show gratitude, I will make my own list out of the things that people have done for me. So here goes.
Lauren Raney's Top 25 ways to show you care:
1. Send a weekly card in the mail to let someone know you are thinking of her.
2. Have your mom knit a blanket or make something yourself for your teacher or her baby.
3. Send flowers or a card or homemade chocolate chip cookies to your child's teacher.
4. Send an email or a text or an instant message to see how someone is doing and let them know she is in your thoughts.
5. Build a nursery. Easy as pie, right? Take a storage room and turn it into a masterpiece. Do this after you've worked a full day at your regular job. Gather a team of people from your workplace and spend every second of your free time creating a much needed room for someone that you may not know really well, but who in turn will grow to love you beyond words.
6. Be a good business owner. Offer your services at no cost to a family because either you have seen firsthand how cancer affects a family or because you are just a good person that wants to ease some of life's every day burdens.
7. Throw together an aerobics fundraiser for somebody at the gym you work at. Spend your free time collecting donations from businesses, printing flyers, and hitting social media to create an amazing event that's filled with this person's friends, students, coworkers, and amazingly kind strangers that despite not knowing this person, will still come out in the pouring rain to support her. Leave this person dumbfounded and wondering what she did to deserve such a kind and powerful gesture.
8. Have your church collect money, knit prayer shawls, or put this person's name in a prayer chain.
9. Have students of all ages create cards for a teacher. The kids don't even have to have had this teacher. Actually, some of these kids could be from a neighboring high school. Make sure these cards are chock full of things this person likes (for example, if this person just happens to like cats, then have the students fill the cards with cat pics and cat jokes).
10. Call a family member and ask how she is feeling, ask if there is anything she needs, tell her that you are sorry she is not feeling well, and let her know you love her.
11. Completely inundate her with cat videos on her Facebook page.
12. Go back to your high school you graduated from and ask how you can help out a former teacher. Then proceed to help in building her a nursery.
13. Go through your own horrible tragedy with a family member and still find the time to think of others and donate money to a complete stranger.
14. Write an emotionally heartfelt letter to a colleague. Open up about your own personal struggles to let her know she is not alone.
15. Write a humorous card or letter to a colleague. Make fun of her weird idiosyncrasies because now that she isn't working, she misses the daily mockery that would always put a smile on her face.
16. Let your teacher know you miss her or you are thinking about her.
17. Have a benefit soccer tournament for a parent. No biggie. It's not like your busy with work, running a soccer league, and having a family of your own. Go ahead and put this thing together with the help of other soccer parents. Hope for about 100 kids to sign up and get 170 instead! Have a fun day with kids of all ages there. Maybe the person that you are throwing the tournament for will show up. Maybe she will take one look at all of those kids on the fields and be a sobbing mess because she just can't grasp how amazing this soccer community is. She will see her own kids playing alongside their teammates, kids they have been playing with or against since they were 4 years old, current students, former students, and amazing volunteer coaches all out there to support her. Maybe she will have no words to express what she is feeling.
18. Go without sleep. Yes, give up an entire night's sleep so a very sleep deprived couple can get some rest. Spend your night tip toeing around their house and doing your best to keep a hungry, fussy baby quiet.
19. Be a good friend to someone's kid. Be wise beyond your years and be there for a kid whose life has been completely turned upside down. Just listen to him/her or just make him/her laugh. Maybe you buy her little sister a gift and write a heartfelt card to her family. Maybe you don't bring anything up and you are just silly because some times kids need a break from the serious stuff. Or maybe you decide to write an essay about your friend being a positive influence despite his personal struggles. Maybe your essay wins a contest and you read it in front of your peers. Maybe the kid you wrote it about it has no idea about this essay until you are about to read it. Maybe he also doesn't know that his parents are in the audience listening and crying because they are so amazed at the young man they call their son.
20. Be a good teacher. Look out for a kid and make sure that school is a place of structure and normalcy. Be understanding about life's challenges and go above and beyond to make a safe and happy place for someone's child.
21. Be a good neighbor. Check in on your neighbors constantly but at the same time, give them space and respect their privacy.
22. Be a good stranger. Better yet, be a good stranger who is battling cancer and send a care package or check up on someone you don't know to see how her struggle is going. And even though you have your own horrific battle to deal with, still ask if there is anything you can do to help.
24. Be a rock. And not a rock for the person in need, but for the people around the person in need. Maybe you let the friend who is struggling vent or cry because she misses her friend or is scared of what's to come. Maybe you let a parent vent because they feel helpless and don't deserve to have another sick child. Maybe you get an overworked, over stressed husband out of his house for a much needed reprieve from the hell of a newborn baby and a sick wife.
25. Be there. Be it thoughts or actual physical presence. Maybe you are an acquaintance, family member, friend, colleague, or stranger. Just know your support means the world to that certain someone. That your kindness and support is what sometimes makes her get out of bed and leave the house. And your love is what makes her want to fight harder than anyone has ever fought before.
So looking at this list I realize it's very specific and I'm not sure it really works for everyone. I'm assuming it won't pop up on my next Google search. Oh well, I like it. I'm sure it's not complete and that I've forgotten other acts of kindness and I'm sure that in the future there will be more to add to it. I hope one day that I will look back on this list and be able to be on the other side of it. I want to cook the meals, and send the cards, and be the rock.
I want to one day sit down with a teenage Sam and show her this list and say, "This is kindness. This is godliness. Now go out in the world and give it back."