If I lined up 100 people on the street and told them they could be responsible for arranging to have someone's mailbox flooded with thoughtful, generous, loving, anonymous letters of gratitude, I am guessing 99 would think it was a great idea (there is one in every crowd).
If I told that same group of people all they had to do, in order to make it happen, was spend 10 minutes completing a short, on-line nomination form, I am guessing the 100th person would even jump on board, agreeing it was a great idea.
The philosophy of the Yellow Envelope Project works. Help us catch your friend in the act of improving her corner of the world and we will motivate her to keep on making the world a better place by showering her with gratitude.
The simplicity of the idea works too. Once your friend is selected as our weekly winner, people from all over the world tune into our website to read her story and to find an address where they can mail her their letters of gratitude, sealed in cheery yellow envelopes.
Even the price point works. Besides the fact that receiving "real" mail is universally loved by everyone, our idea works because it's cheap. It costs absolutely nothing to nominate someone and only $0.44 to mail your yellow envelope. There are few things in life, you can still do for $0.44. Turns out helping to Power the Planet with Shine is one of them.
With so much right about our project, it is easy to be self righteous about that which is wrong. It is easy to be in total disbelief that we should ever - in our lifetime - run low on nominee names.
I want to be indignant and ask how in the world it is possible we cannot locate 52 people, over the course of a year, who deserve having their mailboxes flooded with anonymous letters of gratitude? How?
How is it possible that we - this loyal tribe of readers - cannot mobilize our networks to identify the names of 52 qualified people?
How?
But, I know how.
In the same way we hope to someday Power the Planet with Shine, so too must the Yellow Envelope Project be powered by Shine.
It is people who Shine who will... take the time to stop and think about someone else; someone in their community who goes above and beyond and deserves a healthy dose of gratitude.
It is people who Shine who will... find ten minutes to click here and nominate someone they know who deserves to have his or her mailbox flooded.
It is people who Shine who will... do it now. Not add it to a list of things to do. Not save the email or note the date of today's post. Do it now. Literally, seize this VERY moment to give someone else the gift of your time and gratitude.
It is people who Shine who will... share this post with as many people as they can. They will share it, because they understand that the greater the number of nominations, the easier it is for us to do our job. And, the more people we thank for shining, the more likely we are to someday power our planet with shine.
The idea is good but, like the planet, it must be powered by those who Shine.