Notice ME!

Thursday is grocery day here in the Doll house. Perhaps I am odd, but I do enjoy going to get groceries. I enjoy the planning of meals for the week, making a list and crossing things off the list. I am a list maker. A chronic list maker.

As we travelled the aisles of Aldi today we kept passing a mom pushing a little boy in her cart. He kept saying, "Hello people!" to everyone that passed. If that 'people' didn't look at him, he would say it louder, and LOUDER, until they would acknowledge his happy little greeting. In the last aisle we passed again. He again greeted me, "Hello people!". His mom, obviously frustrated, said, "Would you just stop it! Not everyone wants to say hello to you!!" I have been hurried like this mom apparently was, but I stopped and looked at the little boy and said, "Hello there! How are you? Are you helping your mom shop today?" His only reply was the most gigantic smile.

He just wanted to be noticed.

Aren't we all like that?

We may not say it out loud, but we feel it. We want someone - ANYONE - to notice how hard we are working. We want to be noticed for our doing right. We want to be noticed for our new dress. We want to be noticed. Wrong or right, it is human nature. A need to feel appreciated and loved.

But.....

Isn't it also our nature to ignore those who are crying out to be noticed the most? We react with "OH BROTHER....they are so needy!!" or "What a high maintenance person! Won't they just leave me alone! Who cares what they do!" Again, we may not verbalize these thoughts, but the thoughts are there.

Today when I said a few kind words to the little boy it didn't cost me anything. It wasn't difficult. It didn't cause me stress or make me late and it certainly wasn't anything special.

But......

It made the little boy happy. He was noticed, and that was really all he needed.

Today, as you go about your tasks it will be so easy to get caught up in your 'to do list'. (preaching to me, right there!) It is so easy to ignore, or simply not notice, the many people around us who long to be noticed and appreciated. Won't you say a kind word today? Notice what others are doing around you - And then TELL them that you noticed.

I promise you will be blessed!