Sha Nacino Happy September! 🙂
Hope you had a great August!
As for me, August was our busiest month so far. We were busily happy! Hehe!
I delivered my first TEDx talk, we had the book launch of the graduates of The 90-Day Book Writing Challenge as well as the graduation of the participants of ‘The Eloquent Leader,’ a public speaking program for entrepreneurs and C-suite leaders I developed and delivered at the Asian Institute of Management.
In addition, I had back-to-back meetings for some upcoming speaking engagements and leadership training programs for clients. So grateful!
Let’s dive right into our Story, Highlight, and call to Action for the week 🙂
I have two stories and one mini-story to share today.
STORIES
Story #1: Tey
A few nights ago, I was physically drained but my mind was still very active.
So I decided to take a look at some “feel good” photos and videos I saved on my phone.
I came across one of the videos of my two-year-old Goddaughter Tey.
In that video, Tey was eating raspberry and they were listening to some music on Spotify when Tey said,
“Ninang songs. I want Ninang songs.”
My friend told me, “Sha, Tey wants your songs. She asked me to change the song and play your songs instead.”
I’ve already watched that video over and over and over again since her Mom sent it to me in March 2023 and it still warmed my heart each time.
In fact, when my friend first sent it to me in March, the timing was perfect.
I was crying and my heart was aching because I felt rejected by someone important to me.
And then I saw the video of Tey. It was as if God spoke to me through Tey and said, “You are not rejected. You are chosen and loved, Sha!”
After watching that heartwarming video of cute Tey for the nth time, I sprung up from the sofa and went to my laptop to renew my songs on Spotify so that anytime Tey wants to listen to my songs, she can do so. (A few days prior to this, I made a decision to not renew my songs on Spotify).
It only took one person to inspire me to continue distributing my cover songs on Spotify.
 Me and Tey at Old Town Alexandria in the U.S. (Oct 2022) |
Story #2: Mother Teresa
Yesterday (September 5) was the Feast Day of Saint Mother Teresa of Calcutta.
I love the priest’s homily about Mother Teresa! I could sense that he took time to prepare his homily. He even did some research.
I was almost tempted to approach Father after Mass and say, “Father, I love your homily! Could you please forward your written homily to me so I can share it in my TuesDate newsletter?” Hehe!
I didn’t. Sorry. 🙁
Anyway, let me briefly share Mother Teresa’s story.
St. Mother Teresa dedicated her life to serving the poorest of the poor.
She put up the Missionaries of Charity on October 7, 1950. Its purpose would, in St. Mother Teresa’s own words, “care for the hungry, the crippled, the blind, the lepers, all those people who feel unwanted, unloved, uncared for throughout society, people that have become a burden to the society and are shunned by everyone.”
To date, the Missionaries of Charity is present in 130 countries. Wow!
It only took one person to start a global movement that would help the “unwanted, unloved, and uncared” members of society.
By the way, my Goddaughter Tey and Mother Teresa share the same name. Happy birthday, Tey! 🙂
HIGHLIGHT (Lesson)
“It only takes one person to change lives.”
Call to ACTION
Who is that one person who made a huge difference in your life? Take time to thank him/her 🙂
How can you be that one person who can make a difference in your family, company, and society?
One quick story.
Last Sunday, I shared a simple post on my Facebook page and I didn’t expect it to go viral.
As of this writing, the post has 28k reactions, 1.2k comments, and 4.8k shares.
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Here’s what I wrote in the caption:
When I entered the parking lot of a mall around 12NN today, I saw a group of ‘car wash women and men’ in their green uniforms wave at me and ask if I wanted a car wash. I lowered my car window, smiled at them, and handed them a pack of biscuits.
“Merienda nyo po.” (For your snacks) I said.
One of the women extended her hand and she and the others were literally jumping up and down smiling and saying, “Yehey! Thank you po. Thank you!”
Wow! They were so happy! The joy and gratitude they showed touched me deeply.
After Mass, I realized, it’s not really about the biscuits. When I go to the grocery, I have them in mind — the guards, street cleaners, mall car washers, street children. I buy packs of biscuits and ChocNuts and put them in my car trunk and the passenger seat. They occupy a special space in my heart. I see them.
I’m sharing this not to draw attention to myself… but to draw awareness that regardless of who we are and where we are in our lives, we all have this need to feel safe, seen, and appreciated.
I get sad when I see guards greeting the mall goers, “Good morning, Ma’am! Good morning, Sir!” and the mall goers don’t even look at them as if they didn’t exist. As an empath, I feel sorry for the guards. I know how it feels to feel unseen. Years ago, I once gave out flyers in Megamall as part of a campaign we did when I was still with HSBC and I felt rejected every time the mallgoers pretended not to see me or they shooed me away with their hand gestures.
My heart breaks when I’m inside a posh restaurant and the family at the next table is having fun chatting away while their helper is at the opposite side of the table without any food and looking like she’s not part of the family.
Why do we tend to treat the ones who are economically/socially more successful than us like pedestals (e.g. celebrities, CEOs, etc) and treat those economically/socially less successful than us (e.g. guards, janitors, cleaners, helpers, etc) like they didn’t even exist?
May this post inspire us to be a little more kind to one another. A simple smile goes a long way. We are all equals playing different roles.
#seen
I got inspired reading the comments! In fact, the idea to buy biscuits for the guards, street cleaners, etc. was from one of the comments from my previous post a couple of months ago. The person who commented said they buy coffee for their guards.
We may not have the calling to be St. Mother Teresa but we are all called to be kind to one another.
How can we spread kindness? Check out the comments and ideas from 1,200+ people here.
I wish you fearless possibilities!
Sha Nacino
Keynote Speaker l Author l Adjunct Faculty, Asian Institute of Management
P.S.1 I’d love to hear ideas from you on how we can spread kindness to one another, especially to the members of our society who are often overlooked. You can contribute your comments here. Thank you! 🙂
P.S.2. I was approached by a couple of online news outlets and they asked me if they could share my viral post. I said, yes! 🙂
