It Starts With Us – The Mindstorm

I have been following a Twitter account for a few weeks now without really knowing what it was all about. Today I took some time to find out, and I literally broke into tears when I read about this amazing cause’s mission and what it’s doing for ordinary people who just need a little lift.

It Starts With Us is two things, so far:

It’s a micro-donation non-profit. What is that? It’s a charity that asks for small denominations from lots of people (think Kiva) to help someone truly in need. You can donate as little as $1 a month and make a difference. Nate – the brains behind this – and his team pick one person / family / issue a month (this month’s family is detailed at the bottom of this blog entry), and the money or goods or services they need are called a Love Drop.
It’s a virtual group hug. Once a week, members drop a Love Bomb on a blogger who needs encouragement or support. The Love Bomb recipient can be anyone, and nominations are taken each week for the Thursday Love Bomb of comments to their blog. This week’s Love Bomb recipient got 341 comments of encouragement in a single day.

Count me in, man.

Here’s this month’s Love Drop:

Love Drop is a micro-giving network of people who unite as a community to make a difference in the lives of one person or family a month. By giving just $1.00, they make it easy for their members to change lives in a fun and super easy way.

At the end of every month, Nate and J$ show up in the town the families live in and present them with everything the team raised — all the money, the gifts, whatever the community helped get. It’s all on film, and it all ends with us making a difference! (And then it starts all over again the next month)

This month we are coming together for 2 beautiful kids with severe autism — Ethan & Alex. Our goal is to raise $13,000 on behalf of 4 Paws for Ability so that we can place a highly trained service dog with their family (the dog is completely free, but the training that goes into it is very very expensive). And if possible, three iPads so they can all communicate better with each other (Alex is completely non-verbal). Here are 3 ways you can help:

Join the team – This is the best way to help out, and all it takes is $1.00.
Join our blogger network – Blog about our Love Drops each month like I am 🙂 It’s easy, it’s rewarding, and it REALLY helps spread the word (which in turn helps our families). Love Drop will give you all the content you need.
Give a gift or provide a service – Gift cards to Target, iTunes, Wal-mart, etc would be great! As well as other items or services you think could help out. (Some people even make home-made items, we like creativity!)