Mindful Challenge: Conclusion

When I started the Mindful Challenge, all I wanted to do was to stop making excuses not to be a blessing to people. I realized that the Bible doesn't make exceptions to busy people such as myself, so I set out to get out of my way in order to be mindful. Here are three things I learned:
1 • There are many opportunities to be mindful out there. Once I decided to set my mind to be a blessing, I started seeing lots of opportunities. The good thing was that I never got a complaint about the opportunities I took, people were actually happy and receptive.
2 • It was not always comfortable. Some of the things I needed to do only seemed inconvenient because I was still working with a level of selfishness. The Mindful Challenge exposed some ugly things God wanted to show me about myself. The big lesson was: my character needs to match the character of God in everything I do. He's a giving God.
3 • People are hungry and thirsty for you to bless them. This month I noticed that while most people might pretend they don't need any good thing from me, kind words are always appreciated. I once heard a preacher say: "I'm not 'high maintenance' but I'm not 'no maintenance' either." I know so many people who fit this description. One thing is for sure, they all appreciate words of kindness and encouragement. I also need to be a student of them so I'll know exactly how to bless them.
The Mindful Challenge ended up being a 29-day experiment (I forgot how long the month was) I plan to extend off-line for the rest of the year. What about you? I'd love to hear what you've learned about being Mindful of others.