We would like to wish you and your families a happy and joy filled holiday season.

P.S. Hope you enjoy our video…it may take a few minutes to load BUT it is definitely worth the wait!

Imagine sharing your most memorable holiday stories, inspiring others AND changing the world! That is essentially the premise of our holiday contest…oh ya and did we mention you can win a flight for 2 to Sunny Cancun, Mexico!

the good

This is the season for Doing Good. You could be all humble about it and not tell a soul, but why be selfish? Share your Goodest (most memorable, heartfelt and fun) holiday stories with all of us at Daily Challenge with the hopes of inspiring others to spread the Do Gooding Love.

the stories

You’ll be out doing good anyways, why keep all those smiles and thank yous to yourself? We’re asking you to document your Do Good adventures through written words, pictures and video. Then come back to the Daily Challenge Goodest Story contest page and share your holiday story with everyone.

the stuff

We know you don’t need any more incentives to spread cheer this time of year, but we’re totally addicted to giving! So the Do Gooder with the best (a.k.a. Goodest) holiday story will win the grand prize of a flight for 2 to Sunny Cancun Mexico ($1,800 value). Check out the rest of the stuff we’re giving away!

Hello Do Gooders of the world.

Today I would like to address a question that was recently asked through our feedback form: “Is Daily Challenge a for profit or a not for profit company?”

Well the answer to that question is that Daily Challenge is a for profit social enterprise. Social enterprises are social mission driven organizations which trade in goods or services for a social purpose (Wikipedia).

Our goal at Daily Challenge is to build the worlds largest network of Do Gooders. Therefore, we are working hard to make the act of doing good fun and easy. The opportunity for Do Gooders on Daily Challenge is to be able to suggest challenges that they believe can greatly impact their communities, and invite their networks to join them in completing that challenge.

Who said changing the world can’t be fun!?

Please continue sending your feedback and your thoughts, Daily Challenge is a community built by you for you!

Metro ran a great article on Monday written by David Suzuki and Dr. Faisal Moola, “What would you do with $4 trillion?” with the subheading: Money handed out to failing companies could be put toward saving the planet. The article says that between the U.S. and 17 Western European countries, they’re giving $4.1 trillion to save financial institutions from the economic crisis.

Corporations are suffering but,

The effect on people in developing nations is even worse. Most of them didn’t have savings to begin with, and now the economic crisis, coupled with the effects of the climate crisis - including drought and food shortages - is causing more of our human family to suffer from extreme poverty and joblessness.

So Suzuki suggests that instead of funding companies to continue their business as usual, this money would be better spent in renewable energy sources, sustainable urban planning, and research into methods to reduce the impact of climate change. He thinks by investing into our future as a whole planet, we would in effect be stimulating the global economy.

Brilliant idea, Mr. Suzuki! This article ties into the auto industry bailout initiatives that both the Canadian and American governments are considering. In my mind, this is simply a band-aid solution. Thousands of jobs will be lost if the auto industry goes down, but is automobile production a sustainable industry? Especially considering that gas is a finite resource and automobiles are non-recyclable?

Wouldn’t corporate bailout money be better spent in creating new jobs that have a future? What about funding for the production of cars that use renewable energy, or in creating ways to reuse old automobile materials?

What do you think, Do Gooders?

“Time Magazine heralds Deepak Chopra as one of the top 100 heroes and icons of the century, and credits him as `the poet-prophet of alternative medicine’.” Time Magazine, June 1999.

We are completely head over heels ecstatic about this morning’s news: Deepak Chopra, best selling author and world renowned physician, has joined Daily Challenge and will be participating as a Celebrity Challenger in the near future.

In addition, we’re very excited to join forces with Dr. Chopra in helping him complete his own mission to “Inspire 100 Million people across the world to take a vow of  non-violence in their thoughts, words and actions.”

Already 4777 people have taken this vow with Dr. Chopra. It all began November 7, 2008 when he took the vow personally. Since then, people continue to take this vow with him on a daily basis. Go to http://Itakethevow.com to “watch and support the dramatic effects this  tidal wave of shift in consciousness is going to create.”

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Just last week the Toronto City Council announced two big policies that will help all Torontonians Do Good for the environment. The first one, effective immediately, is to ban the sale and distribution of bottled water at City Hall and civic centres across the G.T.A. By 2011, this ban will transfer to other city-owned facilities.

The second environmentally-sound motion councillors voted on was a $0.05 fee on plastic bags. Starting June 1, 2009, retailers will be required to accept reusable bags and containers in lue of retailer-supplied bags. The final tally was 30 in favour of the bag and bottle measures, 13 against.

Here is the Mayor’s reasoning from TheStar.com:

Mayor David Miller said “free” shopping bags come at a cost. “There’s a cost to the city and the people of Toronto in disposing of them, there’s a cost to the environment and there’s a cost to the retailers,” he said after the vote…

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This was definitely my favorite challenge thus far. It was also the most emotional challenge. We were able to feed 22 homeless people throughout the street of Toronto within a matter of 90 mins and with less than $45.00!

Many were appreciative, some shocked and a few people were almost embarrassed. I think I can speak for all of the Daily Challenge team in saying this challenge made us realize just how lucky we all are for having a roof over our heads and food on our plates.

It is amazing how a slight change in perspective can open your eyes to an entirely new reality.

I know for me personally sometimes I can get so caught up in life that I almost forget to truly LIVE.

In response to a personalized video invite to check out Daily Challenge, Rand Fishkin of SEOmoz.org, a personal hero of our President, Darius, has signed up as a Do Gooder and is ready to challenge us all to do one good.

For those of you involved in the Search Industry, Rand needs no special introduction. You probably know him as the dude with the canary yellow shoes at all the Search Engine Optimization conventions. For the rest of you, Rand is a pioneer in his field and defies the stereotypical marketer. His positive attitude, altruistic actions and good intentions have placed him leagues ahead of the rest, allowing him to find success by doing what he loves.

It is these admirable characteristics that have persuaded us here at Daily Challenge to believe that Rand is an all-around good guy. He fights those who would use the Internet for their own selfish interests while working hard to enhance the true essence of what drives the Internet: collaboration and sharing.

Having someone like Rand in our Do Gooder network will definitely help us all in changing the world for the better. We warmly welcome him to Daily Challenge and we’re extremely honoured to have him star as Celebrity Challenger.

Make sure to check out the site for Tuesday, December 9th, and even better, to accept Rand’s challenge!

Although the extreme challenges have been extra challenging, they’ve been (for the most part) a blast to undertake! We’ve been documenting them to: a) prove that they are possible to complete and b) provide a little entertainment for you, the community.

And from your reaction so far - you love these challenges!

So we want to do more of them, and maybe even raise the bar a bit. We need your help! Please post your extreme challenge ideas in the comment section below. To help you out, here are a couple of examples from the past few weeks:

The Cold Shower Challenge - watch our Pres scream like a little baby. 
Donate a High Five Challenge - almost the whole DC team got in the action with this one!

By the way, if you’re in the King and Spadina Toronto downtown area today for lunch,  the Daily Challenge team will be heading out to complete today’s “Make a lunch for a homeless person” challenge.

If you didn’t catch our President, Darius Bashar, on CFRB this past Sunday, you have a chance to hear him again this Saturday on The Ben Mercer Show! Darius will be there to share the Daily Challenge story with listeners and how Do Gooders around the world are uniting to Do One Good, Daily.

Catch Darius on the popular 1010 AM news talk show at 5pm this Saturday, December 6th.

And there’s MORE…

Flow 93.5 FM Producer to be Celebrity Challenger

Musiklee Inzane is DJ, Producer, Label Founder and Co-Founder of The Real Frequency, the first all Hip Hop show on Canada’s first commercial urban radio station, Flow 93.5 FM. He has graciously accepted our challenge to challenge you!

Check out Muskilee’s challenge on DailyChallenge.org next Thursday, December 11th. And if you’re looking to get your Hip Hop groove on, tune into The Real Frequency on Monday nights from 11PM to 1AM on Flow.