Generosity works like blowback: offer support to others and you’ll find yourself supported. Offer kindness to others and you’ll overflow with kindness. Give courtesy, get courtesy. And, it’s not the response or reaction of the recipient that generates the blowback. It’s the act of generosity. The blowback is self-induced.
Of course, meanness works along the same principle. Hate and you fill yourself with hatred.
Often on our trail we find painted rocks. Symbols, messages and whimsy that someone planted for us to find. They make us laugh. They lift our spirits. We generally don’t take them home. We leave them for others to find or, sometimes, we move them to a new location. We re-plant them. Either way, we giggle. It feels like participating in the kindness.
“I want to paint rocks, too!” Kerri’s inner 5-year-old pouted. She went so far as clenching her fist and knitting her brow. Pouty mouth. I fell on the floor in delight after glimpsing the insistent child she was-and-still-is.
We gathered rocks. We bought crappy craft brushes. We brought out the paint. On a gorgeous Saturday evening, sitting outside in the summer breezes, we painted rocks. Compared to the clever rocks we find on trail, our first attempt was crude but inspiring. “We need better tools,” she said, hands-on-hips, admiring our gallery of rocks-ready-to-be-placed-on-trail.
She googled. She asked friends. Armed with information and the desire for better rock art, she’s in hot pursuit of the proper supplies to produce magical rocks that will evoke smiles from people we will never meet.
Someone out there – a person – one day on the trail, giggled and placed a colorful painted stone in the knot of a tree. It set off a ripple of trail giggles in us – and others. How many people, just like Kerri, found their inner 5-year-old, and exclaimed, “I want to do that!”
The, “I want to do that,” isn’t about the rock (though that’s great fun). It’s about the giggle it evokes in strangers. Think about it.
read Kerri’s blogpost about ROCK PAINTING
chasing bubbles © 2019 david robinson
Filed under: Art, Creativity, DR Thursday, Gratitude, Love | Tagged: artistry, child like, courtesy, david robinson, davidrobinsoncreative.com, generosity, intention, interconnectivity, Kerri Sherwood, kerri sherwood itunes, kerrianddavid.com, kerrisherwood.com, kindness, kindness ripples, painted rocks, story, studio melange, the melange |
The Direction of Intention 
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