The Angel Angle Issue #01
Three pinned topics to jump-start your day.
Over the 4th of July holiday weekend this summer, I flew with Maddie and the boys to spend five days with some friends in their home in San Diego. This would be my first flight since releasing my new book, Angel Man, so I brought four copies with me to hand to an unsuspecting stranger, flight attendant, or someone I connected with during my travels. I returned home to Kansas City with all four books, not having handed out a single one.
As usual, traveling with a four and two-year-old presented a never-ending supply of opportunities to become distracted (and frustrated), and the last thing on my mind was handing a copy of my book to someone. Equally as frustrating was knowing a part of me was scared to start seeing my book end up in the hands of people I don't know.
Three weeks later, I was on my first work trip since releasing the book and decided to grab four books and bring them with me. This time my confidence was elevated. The book was selling. I was getting great feedback. No fear. I decided I'd hand the flight attendants each an angel pin, like I've done hundreds of times over the years, only this time they'd get a book too. As I approached the door to the plane, my feet went ice cold. The fear of handing my book to a stranger crept in and I retreated back to what was comfortable.
"Here, hold out your hand. I have something for you."
Each flight attendant gladly took an angel from me and said thank you. They pinned them on right away. I sat down. I spent the flight reading a new book all the while bummed with myself for chickening out. If my message was going to reach the masses, I knew I’d have to get over my fears. We landed. I thought to myself "When you get up just get the books out of your bag, and hand them out."
Enter the nudge from God I needed.
Over the intercom, one of the flight attendants said, "Ladies and Gentlemen, I just want to thank the man who handed us angel pins when he boarded the flight. We all put them on and are so thankful for your generosity."
I've passed out angel pins on nearly every flight I've ever flown, and never once has a flight attendant announced a thank you over the plane’s intercom system (nor would I want them to).
The stage was set for me to follow through as I exited the plane and I proudly handed a book to the flight attendants and even the pilot, who interestingly enough, had just landed his first plane as a newly promoted captain.
Mission accomplished.
My first Angel Angle SHOUT out goes to Neil Pasricha, a Canadian author, entrepreneur, podcaster, and public speaker who is spreading positivity like it's his job...because it quite literally is now.
Neil is a New York Times Best Selling Author known for his Book of Awesome Series as well as The Happiness Equation and Maddie and I had the pleasure of meeting Neil by total happenstance, on a walk in Beaver Creek, Colorado this past June.
We were there to celebrate our ten-year wedding anniversary. Neil was there to deliver a keynote speech on happiness to the group who rented out the hotel we were staying at. Neil asked us if we knew of a good trail he could walk to use his birdwatch app. Admittedly, when he told me he was birdwatching, my first thought was "Weird hobby, I hope he doesn't join us for our walk" and after a very brief chat, we went our separate ways.
If I had known how downloading the birdwatching app not even two minutes after meeting him would change the course of my morning walks, I'd have invited him to walk with us, hang out with us for the day, and come visit us in Kansas next time he was in the US. As I researched Neil more, I found his podcast, 3 Books, and I now listen to it every morning on my 5 am walk to start each day. It has quite literally shifted my entire perspective and mindset and has brought me an immense amount of joy and has helped me reconnect with reading and my love for it.
So thank you, Neil. Please continue to spread your kindness, positivity, and love for books to the world. One day, I hope to be a guest on your podcast.
Here's how you can shine this week . . .
One of the driving themes of Angel Man is the idea of "paying it forward" and I believe deeply in this practice, so much so that I wrote a book about it. Paying it forward doesn't have to be some grandiose gesture. It can be as simple as handing someone an angel pin. It can be as easy as holding the door open for a stranger or helping someone load or unload their bag from the overhead bin on an airplane.
Whatever the act is, one way to create the habit of being more intentional about how you treat others is to spend a week dedicating yourself to doing one random act of kindness a day. To take it one step further and to solidify its importance or effect on you, journal about it. Write about the random act of kindness. What did you do? Why do you think you did it? Was there anything special about the encounter? How did it make you feel?
Writing about our experience is a great way to connect with it later and to remind ourselves about how simple intentionality can improve the lives of those around us.