Viral Storytelling with The Story Lady, Ronda Del Boccio

Here is the secret of success.  right here.  I’m going to lay it out for you in a moment.

How do I know this is “IT”?  I have learned from the best.  Albert Einstein said that we should seek first to be a person of value and success will follow.  Great message, and my business is all about being of value - my life too.

OK but it goes back before that.  Wallace Wattles in The Science of Getting Rich uses different words but gets to the same thing.  The way you gain more riches (not just money but a rich life) is to do everything as well as you possibly can in order to “outgrow your place.”  In other words, be a person of value and success will follow.

Thank you, Ken McArthur, for sharing this story that is in your upcoming book.  Ken wrote in his blog,

 “I believe people want to have an impact on the world.  They want to make a difference, to leave their mark, to have someone notice that they existed and hopefully leave the world a better place than when they got here.”

This is a story of a Juan Mann (a pseudonym) who gave freely of himself. He wanted to give hugs to strangers.  He did not have a donation can or anything like that. He just wanted to sparead a little love.  He likes making people smile.

The police stopped him for a while, saying that if someone got hurt while he hugged in public, the city could be liable.

True humanity won out, though and he was allowed to hug again.

Watch this video.  It si video of the year on YouTube and voted most inspirational.  This has created huge impact on the world…all because one man wanted to hug 10,000 people he did not know. 

As of right now…Views: 16,534,596 (right from YouTube)

Check it out, soak in the message, and THEN read on.

[kml_flashembed movie="http://www.youtube.com/v/vr3x_RRJdd4" width="425" height="350" wmode="transparent" /] 

Now THAT is a powerful story! 

The music is by Sick Puppies.  You can hear more and purchase their music here.

Find the Free Hugs Campaign website and MySpace site

Ken asks on his blog why we think this made such a huge impact in a noisy world - in an attention economy?

Ken, this is my answer.

We all want to be inspired and to feel that we can be greater than we are.  It is what Joseph Campbell calls the Monomyth - the hero’s journey.  We all long to be great, but most of us don’t do the little things that would add up to big things.

This story is even more inspiring because the law - the Gatekeepers - tried to shut Juan Mann down, but it didn’t work.  Juan Mann prevailed.  Without the obstacles, this would probably not be as powerful a story. And also, Juan Mann wasn’t doing this to make a big stink about it, but someone publicized him.  He was caught in the act of being great, and his simple greatness inspires us.

This story inspires me.  Each one of those 10,000 plus huge that started a movement was one simple little thing.  Not a huge thing - but the small kindnesses added up.  It reminds me that I can do 10 or 100 little things to brighten someone’s day and in that way rise to my own greatness.  It reminds me that I need to stare down my own mediocrity in the mirror every single day.

Thank you, Ken, and best of success to you with your book.  If there is anything I can do to be of value to you, let me know and I’m there.

Ronda Del Boccio, The Story Lady of http://www.storyation.com/