This week while driving down the main street of a small nearby town, a car pulled out from a parking spot into my right fender. I thought the driver had seen me, so I was shocked to hear the crunch of metal on metal. I pulled over to get out of the car, somewhat deflated at the irony of life. I’d just gotten my car back from the shop a few weeks before.

Immediately, the other driver began a sincere apology, taking full responsibility for the incident. He told me that I was in his blind spot. I guessed him to be a college student, and as we exchanged information, this turned out to be true. He wasn’t sure how to proceed; in fact, when he returned from his Dad’s car with registration and insurance cards he’d found in the glove compartment, he didn’t even know which was which. His honesty and desire to do the right thing softened the blow. By the end of our short meeting, we shook hands to introduce ourselves, wishing it had been under different circumstances. And I came out of shock long enough to assure him that accidents happen.

Very fortunately, I’d been on my way to my chiropractor’s office when the accident occurred. After about an hour resting between adjustments, I regained my balance. Sometime during the treatment, my phone rang. The young man had told me his Dad would call, and I didn’t know what to expect. I had my guard up, wondering if I’d have to assert that the accident wasn’t my fault. It turned out to be the driver’s mother. She seemed to be running interference between her husband (who was not pleased at that moment) and her son. She wanted to connect, to be sure I was OK, and to express their desire not to report the fender bender to the insurance company, if that was acceptable to me.

Over the next few days, we spoke several times. I got an estimate for the damage as well as the rental car cost for the four days it would take to repair and repaint. I texted pictures and documentation. She assured me all costs would be covered, and we agreed it would be best for them to pay the auto body shop directly.

Something else happened during these phone calls and texts. Politeness and mutual respect built a sense of trust and goodwill between strangers. We talked a bit about where her son was attending college, and we wished each other a happy new year. When she apologized for any inconvenience to me, I said, That’s alright; everybody learned something. She wholeheartedly agreed, Absolutely! And no one was hurt; that’s what’s most important.

It’s a pleasure to do business with people who demonstrate integrity and goodwill. When we step up to take responsibility, everyone benefits. And who knows that a chance meeting might not be entirely random after all.

P.S. 86 Photos of Acts of Kindness : http://www.viralnova.com/acts-of-kindness-random/

At a holiday breakfast this week for Employee Assistance Professionals and friends, I happened to sit next to a nurse who serves as the Quality Assurance Director of a nearby recovery center. As we chatted about day-to-day work activities, she mentioned a drawback of her current position—the lack of direct contact with patients. But, she said, I like to think that I’m making changes from the top down now.

I asked this nurse-turned administrator (whom I’ll call Elisabeth) more about her past experience in patient care. The energy in the room shifted. She lit up as she shared stories of her earlier career, helping young mothers with babies and small children to turn their lives around.

We were told to report cases to CPS [Child Protective Services], she said, but I thought, how is that going to help the child? So we went into the homes, cleaned the houses, decorated kids’ rooms, and taught young mothers how to run a household. We taught them how to take care of themselves and their children. They were so dirty. We cleaned them up. Cleaned the house. Showed them how to be organized. I wasn’t specially trained in this; it was just from having been a mother myself.

Elisabeth offered an example: A seventeen-year-old mother from the Mt. Vernon ghetto would repeatedly walk into our facility, drop her son in the nursery, and come to the kitchen to get breakfast. One day I told her, “keep your son with you—this is what we’re going to do. Go check his diaper, wash his hands and wash your hands. Then come get food.” When she had a plateful, I said, “Alright. You can have this food, but he eats first. Feed your baby first, then you can eat. That’s how it works.” It was amazing to see the change in her. She went from cursing at me to happily following the routine.

I had fifteen women in all—and years later, they are all still sober. I hear from them all the time. One sends me flowers every Christmas. She says, ‘as long as you get flowers from me, you’ll know I’m sober.’ Twelve of them even went into nursing as a way to feed their families.

The joy and fulfillment of caring for these women and children poured through Elisabeth with a glow that warmed us both in the true holiday spirit. I saw in her a rare caregiver who chose to be present and available to the needs of the moment beyond what she’d been told to do. Without her courage to listen and follow her instincts, children would have been separated from their mothers, and young women may have struggled for a lifetime with the basics of survival.

Maybe Elisabeth wasn’t “specially trained,” but she clearly had a gift for meeting others where they lived and holding the opportunity for them to take the next step.

Directing a musical theater production at a kids’ program nearby, I found myself in the midst of chaos. It was my first time working with this particular program—learning how things are done and how I might help. In decades of directing, I’d never witnessed a situation quite like this one.

The cast of fifteen middle schoolers floundered in a fall session that lacked clear structure. I was repeatedly told this was not the norm, that issues with staff and students had created a tornado effect. But I wasn’t entirely convinced. I struggled to maintain composure at rehearsals, to validate how things had been done in the past while bringing new, simple practices to the table that might calm and focus the actors. Things like beginning rehearsal sitting in a circle in order to be present to one another, to name what’s working well, and to let kids ask questions or share concerns. Or playing brief warm-up games that, at first, the students could not accomplish.

The week of performance, we moved from a rehearsal space into the theater space. This is the point at which the producer and I had a conversation about how to move forward. I introduced the circle idea and the principle of taking care of one another. He was all for it. Yet, there had been so little focused rehearsal time that we still couldn’t manage to get through the whole show. Without the preparation required, lines/cues/entrances/exits/choreography/lyrics sometimes went out the window. And there’d been no real opportunity to explore character or give notes.

I’ve heard it said that a miracle is a changed consciousness. If that’s true, what happened next was indeed a miracle because a gift moment came through to change mine. In a grueling dress rehearsal, I looked up at the end of a musical number to see all the actors in place in their line downstage. In a flash of recognition through their faces, time stood still—and I heard myself say inwardly, I love these kids. When did that happen?

Somewhere in the midst of the chaos, a bond of respect was built while I was busy trying to save a sinking ship. Later that afternoon, two of the older kids approached me to ask if they could please all stay later at the next day’s rehearsal. They wanted to run the show more. There’s nothing more rewarding than having kids trust enough to ask, returning the respect I’d extended. We did stay late the next day, and we made good progress.

At the posting of this story, I’m about to attend the closing performance. We’ve had significant technical challenges, even a snowstorm. Audiences have been extremely patient and forgiving.

While bringing the highest architecture of achievement to a creative endeavor is a worthy goal, perhaps it’s good to experience a bit of a train wreck to remember what’s truly taking place behind the scenes.

At the health food store, I held a paper bag handle in my left hand while trying to load groceries with my right. I juggled my purse, accessing a discount card on my key chain to hand to the checker. I had my hands full.

The woman behind me in line offered assistance. Here, she said, taking the bag handle from the far side, let me help you. I expressed sincere gratitude for her kindness. Then she added, We all need to take care of one another.

Surprised at the synchronicity, I commented, Funny you should say that. I’m on my way to a theater rehearsal for a kid’s show I’m directing and that was going to be my exact message to them—to care of each other on stage.

She smiled. I’ll tell you a story if you have a moment. I’ll be brief. One day I was feeling particularly out of sorts. So, I said to Jesus, Please help me be more like you. I was walking in Manhattan, and there was this homeless man sitting in the middle of the sidewalk. He had blonde hair and blue eyes. He was wearing a shirt, but it was windy and about 60 degrees. I walked by and gave him a dollar. As I continued, I found that I couldn’t take another step—literally I was stopped in my tracks. I realized inside myself that I hadn’t done enough for this man.

She continued. I looked up to see a store in front of me selling sweatshirts for $5.00. I went in and bought a sweatshirt, kneeled down to this man and said, Please put this on; I can’t bear to see you cold. He looked up at me, and actually replied, what are you, a female Jesus Christ?

In that moment, the wave originally gifted to the speaker crashed upon the shore of her listeners—the checker, the woman behind her in line, and me. We fell into a slow motion expression of awe and grace. She finished by saying, I got my answer. What I mean by being more like Jesus is just to take care of your brothers and sisters.

What the storyteller didn’t know was that before I left home for rehearsal, I had asked for help from my spiritual teacher, too. Concerned about the upcoming theater performances, and with a personal issue weighing on my heart, I asked, could I please have some kindness, and some reassurance that I’m doing the right thing with these kids?

I walked out of the store with the gift of our “chance” meeting pouring through me. As I pulled out of my parking spot, I happened to see the storyteller getting into her car. In a sizeable lot, we’d parked facing each other. I waved and smiled, and she warmly waved back.

The night before Thanksgiving, I took a train into Manhattan to teach a class in midtown. The cars were far more crowded than usual, but a kind passenger made sure I had room in his 3-seater row. He practically glowed with childlike joy. I soon learned that he, his wife and young son (sitting in the row in front of us) were on their way to a hotel with plans to attend the city’s Thanksgiving Day parade in the morning. Every now and then, the son turned around to whisper a question to his dad about New York, or the father pointed out something fun, like the new Tappan Zee Bridge. Their palpable excitement co-mingled with Dad’s careful tending of his family by offering time checks and carting luggage.

On Thanksgiving morning, my friend Sue walked from her apartment in Times Square to 6th Avenue, hoping to cross to Grand Central Terminal where she’d catch a train to my place. She laughed as she told me, I saw one balloon and figured, I’ve seen the parade. Earlier in the week, Sue’s sister sent her colorful turkey plates and napkins, excitedly insisting that the child artist must have been a leftie like both of them—somehow redeeming their schoolgirl memories of having been different.

After a walk in brisk air and sunshine, Sue and I entered my kitchen to prepare turkey, gluten-free stuffing, sweet potatoes, brussel sprouts, string beans. I dug out a favorite cranberry relish recipe from my friend Beth whom I hadn’t seen in decades. As I embellished with pomegranate seeds and ginger powder, I wondered where Beth lived now and how she was spending the holiday.

Our friend Larry joined us following a five hour gig at a psychiatric hospital, having played 30-minute sets on each of ten different floors! He glowed with the kind of love that comes from giving service. He said that when he got to the adolescent floor, the staff warned him up front—don’t take it personally; they don’t like anything. But upon entering the room, someone called out, do you know any Beatles songs? and he was in. He knew every request.

Gift moments know no bounds of time or space. A recipe, a song, a parade balloon. Reverberating through dimensions like a golden thread, alive and dancing, humming through an otherwise muted tapestry. Gratitude unwraps the gifts that connects us, bringing the joy of a child’s first trip to the Thanksgiving Day parade.

My car was in need of repair. I’d scraped the passenger side while pulling into my narrow garage one night. Or, as the lighthearted appraiser said when we met, So I hear your garage jumped out and grabbed your car.

The insurance company made the claims process easy. When I dropped off my vehicle at the body shop, a rental car agent met me with the new white Volvo XC60 I’d be driving for the next couple of weeks. We walked the perimeter of the car, inspecting it for any markings larger than three inches in diameter. The agent, whom I’ll call Debbie, carried a small transparency with two concentric circles. By placing the transparency on the body of the vehicle, she showed me the exact size of any markings she would notate. Everything was pristine.

After Debbie showed me the controls on the interior, she asked if I wanted to purchase additional insurance. As I typically do, I declined, saying that my own insurance would be enough. Then she casually added this comment, That’s fine. But if you’re parked at the grocery store, let’s say, and a cart happens to bang into the car, you’re responsible for the repairs and for your insurance premium going up because of another accident. Now, I’m aware that she’s taught to do this, and I didn’t change my mind. But while driving carefully home, I began to get nervous about having some kind of minor incident. I was already paying a steep deductible on my own car. Maybe it was worth the $20 a day.

In the next couple of days, I kept returning to an increasing anxiety about the rental. But then, I perceived what had happened. I woke up to the fact that Debbie had tried to plant a subtle, but noticeable, seed of fear in my mind. I saw it in my imagination as as a brown seed, and I knew that adding my attention to it would make it grow. I decided to interrrupt the usual cycle of worry (what I like to call hamster head), by asking for inner guidance: do I really need the coverage because it’s in my best interest, or can I let this fear go?

What happened next surprised me. I watched as the seed I pictured in my mind’s eye was slowly coated in gold. I didn’t intend to picture that; it came through to me. I found myself a bit more relaxed and went about my day.

By day’s end, I’d released my concern about the rental car. I knew it was important to be careful, but I needn’t grow the seed of fear. I’d be OK as long as I drove and parked responsibly.

Sometimes a gift moment is revealed when a “negative” experience leads to another step. In this case, the choice to ask for inner guidance uncovered a golden seed of trust and knowing that brought peace of mind.

My friend Sue shared a story of meeting European guests who were staying at a friends’ house. Their joy, laughter and service filled her with inspiration. Three women, traveling together, raised the bar on the gift a guest can bring forth when staying in someone else’s home.

Sue explained: When I stayed overnight at my friends’ house, I came after the ladies from Europe were already asleep. By morning when I awoke, I heard laughter in the kitchen. I went downstairs, and they each introduced themselves along with which country they came from—Germany, Italy, Greece—though they knew one another from owning homes in Greece. The three worked as a team, looking at recipes on the kitchen table, deciding what to make for breakfast. When they chose “pancakes,” or what we would call crepes, one tended the skillet, another the ingredients, while the third read the recipe. And as we all gathered at the table, they handed around tea or coffee, making sure everyone had everything they needed. I couldn’t’ get over the fact that they were the guests!

After breakfast, I went downstairs to have a bodywork session with the wife of the couple who owns the house. Upon our return, the kitchen looked pristine and the house was quiet. A note written in German sat on the kitchen table, asking us to call when we were through. We assumed they’d taken a walk. Not at all. Out the window, we spotted one of them in front yard, then one in the side yard, and one in back—all raking leaves! Not only this, but they were using a special broad, triangular oil cloth brought from Germany as a gift to their hosts—a sack with handles that allows you to rake the leaves into the bag and carry them away.

Later that week, I had also been invited to this same friends’ house to meet the European guests. They’d baked both a Schwarzwälder Kirschtorte (Black Forest cake, gluten free) and a Galaktoboureko (Greek custard pie). I may never have tasted finer desserts. Yet it was the musical laughter and joy that struck me as unusual in my world. While we sat at the table, they passed around a video of their arrival night. The husband of the couple, a guitar player, sat in his PJs on the piano bench, playing lively music on guitar. The three European women entered the house, dropped their bags and, without even removing their coats, began dancing.

Sometimes a gift moment continues for a duration of time as an open invitation to a new landscape. How wonderful to accept that invitation and enter an uplifted world filled with joy, light and laughter. Sue and I noticed how these European travelers fed all those around them in every way. By being themselves and being together, the gift poured through. Opa!

Yesterday, my friend Emily and I drove into the city together. She brought up an experience that reminded her of the gift moments I’d been sharing. It was such a small thing, she said, but it had this quality of the stories you tell.

Emily was engaged in an intense performance week as the pianist for the American Ballet Theater at Lincoln Center. Choosing to save her energy to prep and perform one night, she decided to order sushi to be delivered to the stage door. She was told it would take forty-five minutes to arrive, so she went outside for air—enjoying a fresh, intermittent mist in the early evening. She bought a cup of tea, walked a couple of blocks, stopped at a store to look at clothes for her son. She returned just shy of the time limit to find an angry deliveryman awaiting her on the outdoor steps. He reprimanded her, demanding to know where were you? what happened? He’d tried to call three times, but she hadn’t felt the buzz of her phone. The man was very upset about waiting so long.

Emily described her viewpoint: For some reason, though he was quite cross, I was in a happy state. I’d technically arrived under the amount of time I was told, but I couldn’t muster up the energy for a defense. My voice trailed off in explanation.

I handed the man a five-dollar tip, and he asked me to sign for the food. Something started to shift. As I signed, I asked again if he had to wait a long time. He responded curtly, Yes! While still looking down, I spoke the words, I’m so sorry. I said it in a way I’d never apologized before, almost motherly, like when you don’t blame a child because you know he’s doing his best and just needs to be heard.

What happened next was quite remarkable. I looked up to hand back the sales slip and saw he was completely transformed. He was smiling! Literally, in the time it took me to sign my name, whatever gift came through the moment for him, he got it. As if nothing had happened, he seemed happy, serene, a very nice gentleman. I’ve never seen anything resolve that fast. I thanked him, and we parted ways.

I asked Emily what intention she held in the moment of signing her name that allowed for such a quick shift. I never wavered from the open and joyous heart, she answered. If I had an intention, it was to bring a greater sense of love to the moment. It wasn’t about deciding he needed something; that’s not my purpose. For some reason, what came through opened up an inclusive space that we could share together—and it transformed the experience instantaneously.

Emily and I continued to explore how time and space can change completely in a gift moment, allowing a wave to reach all participants. The only requirement? That someone be open.

I walked into the Diagnostic Imaging Center confident that I had all the necessary paperwork for the required test. I approached the counter and signed in, noticing three office workers on phones with another line ringing.

While on momentary hold, “Judy” took my paperwork and insurance card, scanned the card into the system and handed me documents to sign. We chatted as she multi-tasked, and I enjoyed her spunky sense of humor.

I don’t think you need authorization, she said, but I’ll ask. I know the rules changed on October 1st for this particular company. Judy consulted her co-workers as well as a manager who entered from the back offices just at that moment. Oh, yes, they all agreed. This company now requires an authorization.

She turned to me, confiding, it’s my third day here, so I had to ask. I didn’t think you needed one, but let’s see what we can do. Can you wait a bit, and I’ll contact Dave who handles our authorizations? If we’re delayed, you can take my appointment, as I have a sonogram scheduled right after you.

Judy returned to her call. I sat in the lobby with a large binder on my lap reading a script I was directing at a nearby school. Images of how to stage the opening scenes came to me, and I made notes to record the actors’ movements. Thirty minutes later, I was about to check in when I overheard Judy on the phone with Dave, talking in a low tone. Apparently, he hadn’t received the fax she’d forwarded of my imaging order, so the call hadn’t even been placed yet to my insurance company.

I waited a while longer, then walked over to let Judy know I needed to leave for work soon. She asked what I did and perked up when I told her I was directing a middle school musical. Her nephew had been part of an improv group in Chicago and recently relocated to Brooklyn. So I shared a tip on the best place to study in the city.

Judy suggested we reschedule and promised to call me later with an update. We booked another appointment and cheerfully parted ways.

The next day, I got a call from Judy. You’re never going to believe this, she said. The thought flashed across my mind that I’d been denied. You don’t need an authorization for this particular test. I laughed out loud. Of course not, I said. She’d been right in the first place, but deferred to “more experienced” colleagues. I asked how her sonogram had come out, and she filled me in. We were comrades now.

I hung up the phone knowing that life had arranged our meeting for a certain solidarity, a grace of being new at things, a connection with the theater, and a laugh. Everything in its right place for a moment more important than efficiency.