15+ Bright Minds Who Restored Our Faith in Humanity

A tiny good deed, whether from a stranger or a loved one, has the power to affect our lives forever. This is especially true when a random act of kindness occurs when we need it the most. Plus, a thoughtful gesture benefits not just those who receive it, but it may also inspire others to do the same.

Today, we at Bright Side have rounded up some of the most thoughtful acts that people will cherish for the rest of their lives.

• Bombay: it had just poured. I had an interview, so I was dressed in white. There was a puddle as wide as the road...couldn’t have jumped over it or walked around it. I stood staring at the puddle. A car pulled over and he drove me across the puddle.
  © tam_arund / twitter

• Some 10-12 years back, I was very ill with a super low platelet count. Hospital wanted blood donors. Someone I knew vaguely called his college-going brother. The brother, who didn’t know me at all, turned up at Lilavati with 30 of his batch mates to donate blood!
  © shantanub / twitter

• My son was probably 2 or 3, and we went to the mall. My son liked looking at displays and stuff. Well, there was a model train set in a case that you could put a $1 in and watch them go around for a while. I was pretty broke if I recall and never had cash on me. He was content just looking at the display.
  
  A group of loud mall teens come through and go past. One of them comes back and puts a dollar in the machine and says, “I always liked watching trains too,” then hurries off back to his friends. My son lit up. I never would have expected that action from a stranger, let alone a teen with his friends in a mall.
  © ess0ess / reddit

• I had worked many years for a small family company. My boss’s father had terminal lung cancer, and they hired me to assist the son/boss in taking over running the family company. About 10 years later, my own father was diagnosed with terminal cancer that had spread to his lungs.
  
  Unfortunately, his condition didn’t yet meet their standard to provide oxygen at home. My boss immediately ordered an oxygen concentrator. He remembered his own father’s difficulties and knew this would help. He refused to let me pay him back.
  © Lisa Culbreth Byrns / Quora

• It was last year when I was heavily pregnant; I remember I was at the mall and had to buy some baby stuff, so when I was trying to catch a taxi, this other lady took my stuff from the trolley and loaded them into the taxi. I cried all the way home.
  © khuvethe/ twitter

• I finished writing and editing a book about 4 years ago. It sat as a manuscript for a long time. My GF stole the script and had 6 copies printed in high-quality hardback, which she surprised me with for Christmas. I couldn’t speak for about a minute then cried like a baby.
  © its_a_metaphor_morty / reddit

• Moved in the middle of seventh grade. New city, new junior high school. Lunch comes up and I sit on the first bench I get to. Everyone else is in a distinct part of the yard. Someone walks over and says, “You’re new, right? Come sit with us!” He and I never really became friends, but I still remember that invitation decades later.
  © rejeremiad / reddit

• When I was about 5, my mom was single and in nursing school. She had very little money, and we lived in this tiny one-bedroom apartment. An elderly man who lived in our apartment complex dressed up as Santa on Christmas Eve and brought me presents. I can still remember him saying, “Ho, ho, ho! Merry Christmas!” in that wonderful Greek accent. That was one of the sweetest memories of my childhood.
  © shadypines33 / reddit

• When my parents were awful and my sister was passing away, my friends’ parents took me in for a while, but they did it in a way that seemed like a sleepover (for a few months). I didn’t realize until I was an adult how much they stepped up for me.
  © Fat_Bearded_Tax_Man / reddit

• I worked as a bank teller for several years. Sadly, a common problem was people coming in to cancel their bank cards and credit cards because they had lost their wallets or had them stolen. These people couldn’t get new cards on the spot as they also had no ID, as that was also in the lost wallet.
  
  Most of them told me they didn’t even have enough cash on them for a bus fare or taxi ride. I would then lend them an average of $20, but sometimes more if they needed a taxi. All of my co-workers thought I was insane. However, over the years, every single person I’ve helped made a special trip to come and re-pay me.
  © Tindi Crosbie / Quora

Have you ever done something to help someone in need? Do you have any touching stories to tell?