Yesterday four street kids came in who had heard about the grateful bowl. I explained everything to them and they sat down. When I asked how much they'd like to donate they emptied their change cup full of pennies and said "here."
A woman waiting for a to-go order saw this and handed me five dollars. She said, "This is to cover them."
They saw this and thanked her. The four of them looked so hungry, and happy about the food. For the other customers witnessing this interaction one donated $14, and another paid ten for their bowl after seeing all the generosity.
Yesterday made me feel so excited that we offer the grateful bowl, we are helping so many capable people down on their luck make it through so that they can offer their gifts to the world.
I am inspired.

-Marisa

Dragonfly Crystals is the pilot project of Amanda Self, a former Cafe Gratitude shift leader from our Oakland Whole Foods location.  A few months ago, she struck out on her own to pursue her passion, sharing healing with the world through her beautiful jewelry  creations.

A big part of her job at the Cafe was serving "I am Grateful" bowls, the company's by-donation bowl that makes our food available to everyone,  for a suggested donation.  "I often found that people didn't have any money to donate, so I would buy the grateful bowl for them."

This impulse towards generosity showed itself at Dragonfly Crystals as well.  "I've witnessed many people fall in love with pieces they couldn't afford to buy.  They would walk away feeling disappointed. I wanted  to give it to them, but wasn't sure how to do that while remaining in integrity with my business goals."

Early this evening a young gentleman I don't recall seeing before pops in the door and rather sheepishly asks if he might have a Grateful  Bowl, even though he has no money. 

I tell him, "Absolutely, that's what it's all about" (or something to that effect).  So I ring him up for a $5 Bowl and pull a 5 out of my pocket and put it in the drawer.  When I bring him his bowl, he is profusely grateful and strikes an interesting balance between ravaging and savoring his meal. 

While he's still eating, an older gentleman enters.  He also does not look familiar, and had just stepped in the door when he asked me if we did donations for schools, or something along those lines. I understood him to be asking for a donation, but I would soon realize the opposite.  Since I thought him to be asking FOR a donation, I went on to explain to him about our 2-plus year commitment to the community called the Grateful Bowl.  He seemed interested, and asked a few questions about how payment worked and a few other details. 

I love what these yoga studios are doing.  They are making yoga accessible through a pay-it-forward system similar to what we're doing with our Grateful Bowl Program.  I'm calling these types of programs "grateful programs":  where there is no obligation and purely a by-donation service or product that helps to heal the body & planet.  If you know of one near you, let us know at blog@cafegratitude.com!  As we learn of more by-donation yoga programs, we'll announce them here!

Yoga to the People in New York, Berkeley, San Francisco

I am inspired  to write the story of LA YAPA and how this little quinoa company became part of the Café  Gratitude Community!

LA YAPA (meaning: a gift of gratitude) is a family-owned business, started by Tania Petricevic,  a Bolivian-Guatemalan.  Having resided in the US since she was 18, Tania always missed Bolivia and dreamed of going home one day. Life stepped in, however;  she married, had a child and finally decided that if she was really going to maintain the bridge that connected to Bolivia, she would  begin to promote Royal Quinoa into California. And that is how we, at Café Gratitude, met Tania and LA YAPA and decided to introduce the fair-trade, organic item.

Royal quinoa is power-packed super grain (it boasts the highest content of protein after amerynth). Quinoa  once fueled the Incan empire as it's main staple, along with Potato (potatoes originate from South America as well) The Incan Empire was the largest empire of the Pre-Colombian Americas so you can just imagine what the markets must have looked like so long ago! There are several theories as to how large the Incan Empire was, but at one time it bustled with  37 million people.

Post submitted by Anna Grace, our San Rafael General Manager:

"Do you all know, love and adore Bill Vogel, our shift leader at our San Rafael cafe?  I do, so much I can barely define it.  

Bill handed me his credit card & bought a $1,000 gift card with no employee discount.  Then he ordered 3 more cards, 2 for $500 & 1 for $200.  I rung up his credit card, and thank & acknowledge that this is $2,000 going into our thriving business' future.  He then handed me a $500 gift card & says... "This is for anyone that can not afford a Gratitude Bowl".
I said "You know what I get to do with this card Bill?  I get to ring up a $500 I Am Grateful Bowl." 
Essentially this is what evens out all those $1 Grateful Bowl contributions.  Not only did Bill tip the scale on the highest donation to the I Am Grateful Bowl yet & not only did he bump the cafe's sales up $500, he did it with the love & pure generosity that has a woman like me moved beyond tears, to the heart of the work that we do in the world. 
When you give freely, as we have with our I Am Grateful Bowl what we receive is beyond what we thought possible."