I'll bet you've come across more than a video or two of content creators using kindness content to gain clout.
With year after year of growth and the makings of a multi-billion dollar enterprise, philanthropic creator Mr. Beast has given cause for numerous other wanna-be creators to twist his model of success for their gain.
Whether they're going to grocery stores and paying for stranger's grocery orders or approaching other shoppers pleading for help to buy formula or diapers until they find someone who agrees and rewarding them with hundreds or thousands of dollars to turn their social experiment into an attempt to turn a random act of kindness into a viral video.
You may see it and think it's a generous concept, an exploitative trick or wish you found yourself in the position to reap the benefits of their kindness. Whatever the case, we'd be willing to wager this proliferation of phony philanthropic acts also negatively impacts our society.
While basing this on anecdotal observation, constantly consuming random acts of kindness videos as entertainment can create a callous attitude towards our opportunities to share in random kindness. Insufficient funds may prevent us from acting with compassion because these videos condition us to think our acts should meet a minimum threshold. It can lead us to overlook our opportunities to be kind because it's someone else shtick.
Please don't take this the wrong way. We're on board for #teamtrees and #teamseas. These fantastic projects are tremendous examples of creators spearheading positive change by engaging their audiences to act and inform in world-changing ways.
However, if the world is going to change, it starts at the heart of our communities at the individual level. It's not wrong to join with movements created to better the world around us, but it is wrong to believe that's where our duty to act with intentional kindness ends.
That's why we're so excited to join this Random Act of Kindness week and share some simple ways to show kindness to those around us.
We took to Google to find some inspiration to kick things off, so here are 100 Random Acts of Kindness Ideas.
If you have other ideas that have worked well, we'd love to hear from you.
We've got a few ideas of our own, and we'll share some in the coming days to help keep the spark alive. However, we're here to talk about how we can become part of the solution, not add to the problem. We hope you join us in using this week's inspiration to help spread the kindness bug.