One good turn deserves another. Karma. The Golden Rule. Pay it forward. All of these ideas are closely related to a simple concept: when a person does something good or positive, they put out positive energy into the world that will spread like wildfire. Quite a few folks know about the principle of pay it forward by means of the movie and/or book of the same name. But the notion of paying it forward has been around significantly longer.
Once you pay it forward, you are passing on a good deed. For instance, if someone babysits your little ones free of charge, they may tell you instead of paying them, you should give back to society and “pay it forward” by babysitting someone else’s youngsters for free. It is all about doing something nice and the receiver of that kind act doing anything good for someone else. These kind acts then distribute around the neighbourhood, around the town, around the state…
Some say Jesus was the originator of the pay it forward notion. According to the Bible, He showed that acts of kindness and unselfishness may resound to massive numbers of people. Jesus taught that life is reciprocal in that we acquire what we have given to others. More recently, Benjamin Franklin wrote about the notion in a letter in 1784. In her 1916 book, In the GARDEN of Delight, Lily Hardy Hammond wrote, “You don’t pay love back; you pay it forward.”
Catherine Ryan Hyde wrote the book Pay It Forward in 2000 and never expected to be launching a social movement. But that is precisely what happened. In the book and movie, a seventh grade social studies teacher offers his class an assignment to create a strategy which could change the world. One pupil comes up with the thought of pay it forward in which he will perform three acts of kindness. The recipients are expected to also perform 3 charitable acts which leads to the movement increasing exponentially.
Schools around the globe have picked up on this idea and applied it to make their students far more socially aware. For instance, students at the University of Minnesota began a group known as Students Today Leaders Forever. The members of this group devote their springbreaks “giving back” by completing community service projects with the thought that recipients pay it forward. Students at Syracuse University and the University of Toledo embarked on comparable projects. April 29, 2010 was announced International Pay It Forward Day on which people had been encouraged to perform good deeds with the expectation of the recipient paying it forward.
“Hug It Forward” is movement which takes the pay it forward idea and applies it to free hugs. It’s so easy to offer a hug, yet so powerfull. A hug can very rapidly be paid forward and can spread exponentially so that very soon all people in the world has got a hug! On this web site you can now Track Your Hugs on a Google Map so you can see how they spread! What’s more, for each and every hug you track, Hug It Forward’s sponsors will donate 25 cents to Bottle School projects in Guatemala!
