By, Holly Pavlika
Some of my fondest memories are of personal firsts. My first report card. My first time going to sleep away camp. My first job… weeding the neighbor’s garden. My first kiss (which was a giant disaster).
And my first social good experience.
I ended up in tears.
It all started with an idea. I shared the idea with one mother. And another. And another. Every mom said I should just do it. I kept talking to other mothers for further validation till I reached a point where I decided to just take the idea to fruition. I gathered 10 moms, we ideated on a closed Facebook page and we created a “call-to-blog” and a Twitter party.
It was amazing. Just 10 passionate mothers caused 175 other mothers to write blog posts. 250 local news outlets covered what we were doing. And the Twitter party we held created 22 million impressions. There was a huge outpouring of support for the messaging we were sharing. Moms told their personal stories. They emailed their stories and the conversation kept going for days.
It was the first time I realized my voice had some power. It was addicting.
This is what happens when passionate people get together.
We find each other. We inspire each other. We create noise. We forge connections. We spur action.
And this August, we urge you to join us.
Last year contagious actions resulted in 36,000 life-saving vaccines for children during Blogust.
An additional 3 million vaccines were given from the first-ever “Give A Shot, Get A Shot” campaign with Walgreens.
It just took ordinary people like you and me taking simple actions: sharing or commenting and raising our voices as one to say we care.
There’s no better feeling then knowing you contributed to paving the way for a child to have a happy and healthy life. And their lifetime of firsts… from smiles to giggles to wherever life takes them.
During Shot@Life’s Blogust 2014—a month-long blog relay—some of North America’s most beloved online writers, photo and video bloggers and Shot@Life Champions will come together and share stories about Happy and Healthy Firsts. Every time you comment on this post and other Blogust contributions, or share them via social media on this website, Shot@Life and the United Nations Foundation pages, Walgreens will donate one vaccine (up to 60,000). Blogust is one part an overall commitment of Walgreens donating up to $1 million through its “Get a Shot. Give a Shot.” campaign. The campaign will help provide millions of vaccines for children in need around the world.
Sign up here for a daily email so you can quickly and easily comment and share every day during Blogust! For more information, visit shotatlife.org or join the conversation on Facebook and Twitter.