I experimented with my first servebration earlier this year when I passed 5k followers earlier this year and had a blast helping people, so want to do it again today…
Yesterday, I surpassed 10,000 Twitter followers. Woohoo! A huge, heart-felt “Thank you” to all of you! I have really enjoyed the encouragement, discussion, learning, and fun I’ve experienced engaging with you on Twitter.
I don’t think the number of the number of Twitter followers is really all that important. But 10,000 is a nice, round, shiny milestone. And I’m always looking for a reason to celebrate.
I could giveaway an iPod, an iPad, or some other gadget, ask you to comment & retweet, blah, blah, blah. But that’s been done a thousand times. Bor-ing.
I’d like to celebrate this milestone by doing something completely unconventional. Something in line with true spirit Twitter.
Twitter is all about building relationships, right? It’s about adding value to those who follow you. It’s about giving and serving others.
So, I’m going to celebrate this milestone by giving away myself.
Throughout the entire day I want to serve you by giving you my time, my energy, my knowledge, and anything else you can think of. So…
- How can I serve you today?
- What question can I answer for you?
- What favor can I do for you?
- What can I give to you?
- What can I do to make this day better or brighter for you?
Post a comment and let me know. I will try my best to respond to every request posted. If you think it’s too big an ask, try me and find out.
If the request is too personal to post publicly, you can DM me.
I would love for you to retweet this post and help get the word out, but you don’t have to. This is my gift to you and it wouldn’t be a gift if I required something from you in return.
I would love nothing more than to celebrate 10,000 Twitter followers by doing 50 acts of kindness today for people like you.
Well, congrates on the 10,000 I would love that. More so I would love it if 10,000 people would buy my books. It has been life long dream to be someone important and I love the social networking world, I recently revamped my site http://www.mypurplebutterfly.net to help others, promote their work and feed my brain with new and interesting subjects.
Thanks. As much as I’d like to help, I don’t think I can get you 10,000 followers or sell 10,000 books. 🙂 I did go to http://www.mypurplebutterfly.net, though, but I couldn’t find any info about your book. Did I miss it?
First, I have to say your writings on true intentional, conscious living is vital to our times right now, and my life and how I choose to live. My request, hmmm… you’ve given so much already! I believe in staying involved with people but that also means dealing with the difficult ones. My positive approach and faith in knowing that God does the judging and I do the loving helps. Do you have any ideas to keep this daily focus?
Thanks & blessings,
Carmel
Hi Carmel,
That’s a great question. It would make for a great blog post. Here are my unrefined, off-the-top-of-my-head thoughts about what I do to try to stay positive even when dealing with difficult people.
– I start the day with scripture and prayer. I ask that God would give me opportunities to demonstrate his love and grace throughout the day.
– Remind myself that sometimes interruptions (particularly if they are people) are not interruptions but the opportunities I was praying for.
– Give people the benefit of the doubt. Maybe the difficult person is having a bad day, or their job is in jeopardy, or they have a sick family member. Or maybe they’ve just had a rough life.
– Remember that I can only control my own behavior, not the other person’s response. And I certainly can’t change anyone. So, I can be helpful, encouraging etc. I can’t control whether that person appreciates my help & encouragement, or they flip me the bird.
– Don’t feel obligated to help every one. Some people don’t really want our help or encouragement and just suck the life out of us. Sometimes its better just to avoid certain people and invest our time and energy in others.
– Give visual reminders. Sometimes it helps to post a note, a picture, or something else in a place I’ll see it throughout the day to remind me of things like this.
Hope that helps. What do you think? Anyone else have any suggestions?
Dude! Congrats on the milestone! Personally, I could go for the iPad or even a Kindle (one with the big screen)… 😉
Seriously though, the only ‘needs’ that I have right now are around my upcoming trip to Haiti, and we are in pretty good shape overall. But we have a team of 50 scheduled to go, and we are trying to raise money for the trip right now. I’m not asking for you to make a major financial contribution yourself, but any help getting the word out would be great…
Information about the trip can be found on my blog at…
http://bibledude.net/2010/06/the-haiti-diaries/
And financial support can be donated at…
http://www.missionmixup.com/mymissions_detail/mymissions_id/218.html
So feel free to tweet it up, blog about it yourself, or do whatever you want with it. I know that your church also just sent a team down, so I appreciate any buzz you might help me create about our too…
Thanks dude! You rock!
Dan, I think it’s awesome that you’re going and that you’re taking such a big group of youth with you. I hope it is a life-changing experience for everyone on your team as well as the Haitians you serve.
I’ve tweeted it and encouraged those who follow me to read about your trip and support it.
Yeah, I’m expecting that the people of Haiti will minister to us just as much (if not more) than we will to them. It’s going to be an amazing trip! Thank you for your support!
Congratulations Paul!
I enjoyed today’s post and, particularly, your reply to Carmel’s question. Thanks for the reminders and insights. My request comes in two parts and is driven mainly by my ‘search for meaning’ (if you will) in the social media stratosphere.
1) How on earth do you manage to keep up with and interact with 10K followers?!
2) What drives you to blog? I haven’t begun yet because I don’t know where I should start, really. Questions like, “Of all my many interests, how do I approach blogging?” or, “Do I even have any valuable content to offer the already vast-in-scope blog-o-sphere?”
As you’ve already been at this social media stuff for quite some time (and I consider myself a neophyte), I respect your opinion.
Have a great day!
~David
Hi David, I’m glad to hear you’ve found my tweets and posts worth your time.
>>1) How on earth do you manage to keep up with and interact with 10K followers?!
A lot of people have been asking me that lately. I’m considering writing a blog post or perhaps even an ebook about managing Twitter to address the question in depth, but the short answer is… I make heavy use of Twitter lists. Some lists I check more often than others. I don’t see every tweet of all 10k people, but I try to respond to as many DMs and @replies as I can.
2) What drives you to blog?
There’s two things that I’m really passionate about. The first is helping Christian organizations communicate more effectively online, which is what I write about on blog.ourchurch.com. The second is helping people live up to their God-given potential, which I write about here. Through blogging I’m able to teach, inspire, and connect people with others.
What are you passionate about? What do you dream about?
very cool, well done – you already honoured me by including me in your tweets about this milestone 🙂
Paul,
On the subject of staying involved with people, including dealing with the difficult ones, I so appreciate your thoughts on this. God’s grace has for a long time helped me be patient with folks and I believe in giving people the benefit of the doubt. It’s when I’ve exhausted the list, and I see we’re on the same page here, I fall on “live and let live”. Especially where I recognize the person can become toxic to my life. My personal example here is a supervisor I had. Since leaving the job, I have had a week of reflection and with your thoughts I come away from the experience knowing I did my best, showed restraint and patience and well, honestly bailed when it became unhealthy. I learned resiliency and that whenever you find yourself hitting your head against a brick wall, or sitting on the fence not knowing what to do next, maybe what’s keeping you from the next best step is fear, or lack of faith. Move from that place because you just might miss something wonderful! I moved off the fence, and 2 days later (this week) I got a job offer from a wonderful person without even seeking!
Continued blessings to you and all you do ~
Carmel
That’s great, Carmel! Sounds like you did all you could in a difficult situation, and then made the right move to get out.