Random Acts of Kindness.

It is nice to be important but it is more important to be nice.

We often don’t realize how far our random act of kindness can go to lifting up or making someone else’s day. The little smile, that show of concern, that nudge or push to let others see the greatness in them could light a fire. Many of us are so focused on our lives and responsibilities that we forget to see the constant opportunities around us to be kind. We may not always go outside of our way for others because we don’t feel connected to them. Perhaps we are caught in a mind of scarcity or too busy to notice those around us. There are always opportunities to be kind, and it is essential to remember that the smallest act of kindness can mean the world to someone else.

I have learned silence from the talkative, toleration from the intolerant, and kindness from the unkind; yet, strange, I am ungrateful to those teachers. – Khalil Gibran

Pay It Forward

Random Acts of Kindness Day is a day set aside to encourage and celebrate random acts of kindness. The day is celebrated on February 17 in the US and September 1 in New Zealand. Pay It Forward is an expression for when the recipient of an act of kindness does something kind for someone else rather than simply accepting or repaying the original good deed. It is synonymous with the concept of Enlightened Self-Interest – behaviour based on the awareness that what is in the public interest is eventually in the interest of all individuals and groups.

One of my favourite movies of all time is Pay It Forward, a movie based on Catherine Ryan Hyde’s novel, which was published in 1999 and adapted into a movie in 2000. In the film, Social studies teacher Eugene Simonet (Kevin Spacey) gives his class an assignment: look at the world around you and fix what you don’t like. One student comes up with an idea: #1 it is something that really helps people; #2 something they can’t do by themselves; and #3 do it for them, then do it for three other people.

Seventh grader, Trevor implements the plan himself, forming a branch of good deeds. His first deed is to let a homeless man named Jerry live in his garage, and Jerry pays the favour forward by doing car repairs for Trevor’s mother, Arlene. He further pays forward by preventing a woman from killing herself. The movie’s core lesson is to be the change that we want in the world. Your small random act of kindness could go a long way to changing someone else’s life.

“Let no one ever come to you without leaving better and happier. Be a living expression of God’s kindness: kindness in your face, kindness in your eyes, kindness in your smile, kindness in your warm greeting.” – Mother Teresa

In his 2013 speech at the Syracuse College of Arts and Sciences undergraduate convocation ceremony, English professor and author of The New York Times best-seller Tenth of December, George Saunders, advised, “Err in the direction of kindness.” Sanders recalled a situation in seventh grade when a young girl in her class was teased by her classmate. Although he did not tease her and even defended her a little, he still thought about it and regrets not defending her more than he did then. He said:

Now, why do I regret that? Why, forty-two years later, am I still thinking about it? Relative to most of the other kids, I was actually pretty nice to her. I never said an unkind word to her. In fact, I sometimes even (mildly) defended her.

But still. It bothers me.

So here’s something I know to be true, although it’s a little corny, and I don’t quite know what to do with it:

What I regret most in my life are failures of kindness.

hose moments when another human being was there, in front of me, suffering, and I responded … sensibly. Reservedly. Mildly. Or, to look at it from the other end of the telescope: Who, in your life, do you remember most fondly, with the most undeniable feelings of warmth? Those who were kindest to you, I bet. It’s a little facile, maybe, and certainly hard to implement, but I’d say, as a goal in life, you could do worse than: Try to be kinder.

It’s a little facile, maybe, and certainly hard to implement, but I’d say, as a goal in life, you could do worse than: Try to be kinder.

Now, the million-dollar question: What’s our problem? Why aren’t we kinder?

Here’s what I think:

Each of us is born with a series of built-in confusions that are probably somehow Darwinian. These are: (1) we’re central to the universe (that is, our personal story is the main and most interesting story, the only story, really); (2) we’re separate from the universe (there’s US and then, out there, all that other junk–dogs and swing-sets, and the State of Nebraska and low-hanging clouds and, you know, other people), and (3) we’re permanent (death is real, o.k., sure–for you, but not for me).

Now, we don’t really believe these things–intellectually we know better–but we believe them viscerally, and live by them, and they cause us to prioritize our own needs over the needs of others, even though what we really want, in our hearts, is to be less selfish, more aware of what’s actually happening in the present moment, more open, and more loving.

Your life is going to be a gradual process of becoming kinder and more loving: Hurry up. Speed it along. Start right now.

Daily Calm with Tamara Levitt – No Problem

“The boundary to what we can accept is the boundary to our freedom.” ― Tara Brach, Radical Acceptance: Embracing Your Life With the Heart of a Buddha

Sometimes, when we sit down and meditate, it feels like our mind is racing the whole time. For some meditators, this leads to the frustrating feeling of sadness. Meditation is learning how to accept and be with whatever arises. The practice is about developing equanimity, which means being at peace with whatever is in our experience. Meditation is not about controlling the mind, it is about working with the mind.

“Somewhere in this process you will come face-to-face with the sudden and shocking realization that you are completely crazy. Your mind is a shrieking gibbering madhouse on wheels barreling pell-mell down the hill utterly out of control and hopeless. No problem. You are not crazier than you were yesterday. It has always been this way and you just never noticed. You are also no crazier than everybody else around you. The only real difference is that you have confronted the situation they have not.”― Bhante Henepola Gunaratana, Mindfulness in Plain English

Daily Jay with Jay Shetty – Plans vs Presence

Children are masters in presence. It is one of the keys to mindfulness. Sometimes suppressing your urge to stress makes you more stressed. Instead, if you allow yourself to consider what could go wrong.

Daily Trip with Jeff Warren – Helpers