The AOK Story

Like most awesome things, AOK (Acts of Kindness) started out by chance. In 2019 I gave a TEDx talk called, “Do What Makes You Love Yourself,” and in that talk I made a simple request of my audience, asking them to go out and do at least one AOK (Act of Kindness) a day for a week. People responded to that message in a big way and for weeks after my talk folks were reaching out to let me know they did their AOK a day. I knew then, there was something bigger with AOK’s.
Then in early 2023, while working at Trader Joe’s, I was fortunate to meet and interact with the wonderful Mulligan family which would re-energize my passion for kindness and help me understand the true power of AOK!!! 
The family was shopping for groceries when I spotted sweet Livi, her brother, and mom. After approaching the family to see if they needed anything I realized how special this bright little girl was. She was pure joy, had a smile as big as the sun. I also recognized that she was differently abled, having Down Syndrome.
Her happiness was contagious, and a few minutes later I was compelled to check back in with the Mulligan family and asked Livi what her favorite color was. Her mom, Mandy, let me know that she wasn’t very communicative, I took one look at the pink in her shirt and knew exactly what my next steps would be. I went over to our flower section and picked out some beautiful pink roses and returned to give them to Livi and the family. Livi dove her nose straight into the flowers and it was evident she was delighted. Come to find out her middle was Rose and more importantly, she absolutely loved flowers. 

I thought our interaction was over, but several minutes later Mandy asked if I would take a picture with Livi to celebrate the fun flowers. “Yes!!! Absolutely,” was my reply. The pictures turned out great. Her energy shined through and I smiled as big as I ever have. The whole family was happy and it made me feel so good to experience this moment with them. After the pictures we all exchanged hugs and said our goodbyes.

Thinking that was the end I went on my merry way, but like KINDNESS can do, it kept growing.
A few days later one of my managers showed me a Facebook post by Mandy with the pictures of Livi and I, and an explanation about our interaction. It was such a wonderful post and a nice reminder of the beautiful encounter. It was also surprising to see the post with 35,000+ likes - we’d gone viral! Fast forward to a few weeks later and the local news was at Trader Joe’s doing a story about our interaction. They highlighted my kind act and asked me about my thoughts on KINDNESS. During the interview I talked about AOK’s and let my community know that if you do one AOK a day, that the world and you will be okay. The story was well received and ran all weekend on WXII and eventually made its way to become a national story on MSNBC and other networks.
The ripples from that story lasted for months. Many people visited me at work and thanked me for the KINDNESS I had shown Livi. They’d also mention if they were trying to create more AOK's in their life. It was pretty spectacular to me that once again, the little idea of AOK was resonating with the community in a big way.   
AOK Takes Over the World

I knew after this cycle of events that the idea was a blessing from the Universe and I must create something with AOK and put it into the world! After about twelve months here we are, I am doing it. AOK led me to create the YESIVERSE and our mission at YESIVERSE is to foster a space of love, acceptance and accountability through our collections of t-shirts and stickers. We are a universe that values KINDNESS and knows there are health and cultural benefits backed by study after study that proves KINDNESS improves physical and mental health in the person that gives the KINDNESS and the person receiving the KINDNESS.

All of our collections are wonderful reminders of our mission and continue to celebrate that day with Livi and all the great things that followed.
I would be honored if you would help me get this story and the energy of KINDNESS out into the world. You can start doing one AOK a day in your own life and see how things change. See how you change, how the community around you changes. Buy a shirt, a sticker or 10 as reminders that KINDNESS is a complete win for our world and it is always an option.  We are all capable of kind acts.  Let’s go out and do one today!