People need your encouragement more than they need your advice. A little encouragement at a pivotal time makes all the difference.

I am giving you a Christmas gift: When you have opened it, you will become the right person, doing the right thing, at the right time, in the right way.

To open your gift, you need only to buy what the kids are selling.

Randy Phillips gave me this gift and I’m glad he did.

We were in church when Randy went on a little rant.

He said, “Buy whatever the kids are sellin’… Buy whatever the kids are sellin’… Sometimes you come out of a restaurant or a grocery store and they’ve got a little table set up, and you try not to make eye contact with’em. It’s like, ‘If I can act like I don’t see’em, I don’t have to buy it.’

Get over there! Go to that table. They’ve got that wrapping paper. You can buy it half-price somewhere else. It don’t matter they’ve marked it up 100%. You don’t need it? What you need is not the issue! You go over there and you buy what the kids are sellin’.

They got cookies? ‘I don’t eat cookies.’ This is not about what you eat! Buy what the kids are sellin’. Here’s what I do. I walk over to ‘em and ask, ‘What is the largest amount that you’ve sold today? Who bought the most?’

‘Well, they bought 5 boxes.’

‘Give me 10. I want 10 boxes.’

Denise says, ‘What are you going to do with 10 boxes of cookies?’

‘I don’t know. Don’t worry about that.’

The look on their face when you are building confidence in a kid across the table! ‘This is how commerce works. This is how we do it in America. You have something of value. I give you money. We trade it. And here we go.’

We’re teaching those kids! Buy whatever the kids are sellin’.”

Encouragement speaks loudest when it is followed by action. Your action.

Always buy what the kids are selling. Give a child the gift of encouragement and hope. It takes only a moment. Then you can give away the thing you bought and explain why you bought it in the first place. Kindness is contagious. Perhaps the recipient of your gift will be inspired to do the same.

You are a generous person who likes to encourage others.

This is the secret to your happiness.

Roy H. Williams