Day 1

28 day/28 gift generosity challenge
Day 1 complete with emotional commentary.

I woke up obsessing about what I was going to give and who would I give it to? I mean I started this challenge, and day one I am already feeling the push to let it go. You know that feeling you got when a faster kid on the playground challenged you to a race and you become a defense attorney for the stupidity of foot racing. Yeah, that feeling. But this is a challenge. Challenges shouldn’t be easy, so in the midst of nervous energy it hit me. In fact I had seen it about 5 times today and 5 times every day for the last week. 3 massive piles of oak tree leaves in my neighbors yard.

I have tons of my own yard work and am much too busy! It was too late. The voice in my head was chanting, pick ‘em up Adam. Pick ‘em up.

So when I go home, I got the garbage can, a couple trash bags and started picking them up. I wondered if people driving by new what I was doing, if they new I didn’t live there, it was kind of exhilarating, The task was making me think however: Why am I doing this? ( I was getting sweaty now) : is this for me, for my neighbor, are these reasons noble or selfish? I kept working.

I was caught in the act. He drove up and said “no one has ever done anything this nice for me before.” I told him about the challenge and how I thought about his yard on my way home today, he then told me that he too was dreading these leaves on his way home. He thanked me again.
We talked for another 10 minutes while I finished up.
It wasn’t until I was bouncing home that I realized the challenge doesn’t care about my motives. Its job is to force me to act. As I act, I am becoming. No longer inspired by stories of generosity but creating my own.

Hope you commit to the challenge with me.
Adam

P.S.It ended up being way more than I thought, 7 bags of leaves.