Ten acts of kindness to 10 random people each day for 10 days.
Reggie Dabbs challenged students at Luverne Schools last week with just that, a 10 for 10 Challenge. If one student completes the 10 for 10 Challenge, 100 people will know they matter. If 10 students complete the challenge, 1,000 people will know they matter.
“You have nice eyebrows” started the challenge for every student in attendance. Was that a surprising and funny example? Absolutely, but it was also an example of looking at a person and how simple one random act of kindness can be.
Reggie presented a funny, age-appropriate message to every student in K-12 at Luverne Schools on hope, kindness and never giving up on life. He shared his testimony about finding out his parents were foster parents and how he wanted to give up on life but didn’t. Today Reggie is a motivational speaker for every NFL team, four NBA teams, and travels the world to speak to 1.5 million school-age students every year.
Our words can help or hurt. What will you choose? If you knew that the person you passed on the street was thinking, “No one notices me, no one cares about me, no one will notice if I die,” would you choose to show them kindness?
Statistics tell us that one in five people in the U.S. have some sort of diagnosed mental illness. Even if a person doesn’t struggle with a diagnosable mental illness, they can still go through seasons of negative thought patterns and overwhelming feelings such as stress and social anxiety.
Acknowledging suffering is not only OK, it’s an essential part of walking through mental illness.
Following are statistical data and information from the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention www.afsp.org:
•The second-leading cause of death for ages 10-24 in Minnesota is suicide.
•Based on the most recent Youth Risk Behaviors Survey from 2021 (most recent results), 10.0 percent of youth in grades 9-12 reported that they had made at least one suicide attempt in the past 12 months.
Now that you read those statistics, what will your response be? We can always choose kindness, but can we do more?
Connect with Luverne Schools: Amy Cook, Stacy Schepel and Marie Atkinson-Smeins.
Support a community organization. Check out Carson’s Cause.
Check out Canvas Health Suicide Prevention for information and coordinator contacts.
Find a church community. Christians aren’t exempt from negative thoughts, overwhelming feelings of stress or mental illness. Mental illness doesn’t seem to discriminate. But as Christians we can find comfort with fellow believers to share our burdens. And best of all, we have peace and hope in Jesus.