An apple a day.
We can all count the seeds in an apple. But what kind of a world can we reap if instead we count the apples in a seed?

After stuffing myself silly yesterday, I'm starting fresh today (pardon the pun) by pledging to eat an apple a day for the next week and into the new year.

We got home last night from a terrific family dinner to find the annual huge pile of newspaper flyers advertising boxing day deals and door-crasher specials for just about any consumer good imaginable. Now, I am all for stimulating the economy and I have a healthy appreciation for a good sale (especially if it's on items that we genuinely need). But really, after being blessed by the generousity of friends and family this Hannukah and Xmas and throughout the year, it's fairly safe to say that I don't really NEED any more yarn, bath products, clothing, jewelry, or whatever. Possibly ever in this lifetime.

So I am feeling rather blessed and I want to spread it around a bit. This morning, instead of planning to hit the streets and the stores, I donated a little extra cash to Doctors without Borders and some to the The Tso Pema Medical Emergency Fund

This Boxing Day, consider donating to a worthy cause instead of (or as well as) shopping. And if you are feeling the economic pinch and you cannot donate money, then consider doing a kind deed for someone - it can be as simple and uncomplicated as a kind word, a phone call, or shoveling someone's driveway, to something on a grand scale, like doing some research today and pledging one day a month to building homes for people who need them or sorting and stocking at a food bank. For that matter, if you can, then why not do both - donate the funds and donate your time, effort and good will.

Do it openly or do it anonymously, whatever makes you feel best. Then sit back, have an apple or a cup of tea, and bask in the glow of collective Karma generated by all the small and grand acts of human kindness and generosity. And maybe it will inspire you to cultivate this habit in the coming year and all the days of your life. Each seed you plant grows a new tree and lots of apples for years to come. If everyone would help someone else in any little (or big) way, what a wonderful world it would be.

An apple a day, indeed!