Kindness. In a surprising cultural time of snark, derision, and callous cruelty among people, it becomes a powerful and healthy counter-cultural act to be kind. If you use social media for any time and watch the news nightly, you'd almost think kindness was a foreign language, or perhaps the hardest thing in the world. And it's the very opposite. It's built into our nature as one of the requirements for proper spiritual growth and inner fulfillment. When we show kindness to others, we certainly benefit them, as well as the general tenor of society, but the deeper reality is that we cultivate our own garden in a beautiful way. So I often ask myself: Why wouldn't everyone want to do this? Nasty benefits no one. Kindness is good for all.
I post on controversial things across social media. I call out corruption, blast the worst forms of self dealing leadership, name and shame vicious behavior in all domains of human life, and dive into controversial issues with questions and distinctions and cautionary notes that many people don't want to hear. I don't intend to do it, but I sometimes make people mad. Some are merely irked. Others are enraged. How dare I? Well, I'm just following in the footsteps of Socrates. Yeah, and look what that brought him. I know. So I'm not utterly perplexed by this phenomenon.
But the thing that really does surprise me is that the posts of mine that seem to spark the most ire are often my recommendations of kindness. No, I'm not kidding: simple kindness. I often mention it here and on other social platforms, and in a very positive way. We should be kind. We need to bring more kindness into our work lives, our home lives, our politics, our simple daily interactions with others. And rather than everyone nodding and agreeing that we do need to be reminded of that now and then in our time, and maybe sending me a cute stuffed teddy bear for my efforts, I often see angry and offended people shoving these recommendations back in my face.
Kindness is a cheap perfume, they seem to say. Manners can mask monsters. Nice is syrupy and saccharine and utterly inauthentic. Some cynics will rail about Southern Hospitality and down-south friendliness as if it's always a case of some spider inviting a fly into her vast web of deception. Say WHAT?
There is plenty of counterfeit wisdom in the world, and faux virtue. There are false versions of nearly everything that's good and true and honorable. But should that for a second make us hesitant about what really matters? It's only an unkind view of the world and those of us in it that will automatically interpret a recommendation of kindness as a suggestion that people be duplicitous and false, when they're actually better off indulging the inner jerk and treating others awfully, or with disdain, or at least as if they don't matter at all. Here’s the real news: Not every appearance of goodness is a matter of hypocrisy and deception.
Kindness, by actual contrast, is the first level for applying the famous Golden Rule, treating others the way we'd want to be treated if we were in their place. And it's actually the first step in self care. It's only when we're kind to ourselves that we can improve ourselves in healthy and wise ways. I think that kindness is where morality and ethics all begin. It's a thing of the spirit, and is as powerful as it is simple.
I'm not the first to push kindness, and I hope I won't be the last. And if anyone reads this and you somehow feel your blood pressure rising, I would hope that you'll be kind to yourself and take a deep breath, and reconsider your irritation before you shoot me an authentically mean reply. As we say in the South, "Namastay!"
The World as It Is. A car sped down a rural road and what looked like trash was thrown from the window. The farmer mowing nearby stopped his work and walked over to pick up whatever paper had been thrown into his field so that the mower wouldn't shred and spread it everywhere. It wasn’t paper, but a puppy just a few weeks old, covered with bruises and now with a newly broken tail. The astonished man picked him up and took him home. A friend of his sent a picture to a friend of mine named Doug who immediately adopted him and called him Miller. That was two years ago.
Recently, Doug and Miller were at Lowe's Hardware and Miller pulled hard at his leash to get to a lady standing near an end-cap. Doug pulled him back in surprise. It was odd behavior for the ordinarily well behaved dog. They found their item and got in line. Miller pulled again and this time moved around behind Doug, who then turned to see what was going on. It was the same lady. Miller was instantly sitting next to her with his head leaning on her leg. She was crying.
"I'm so sorry." Doug had no idea what was going on.
"No, no. I had to put my dog to sleep a few hours ago."
Dogs know a lot more than we think. They understand and feel in ways we sometimes can’t even imagine. Honor the animals in your life.
And maybe ask them, "How's the stock market going to do tomorrow?" And let me know.
The opening picture above is of the puppy himself on his first trip to the vet! And now two years later, the comforter: A truly good dog.
I’m reading a wonderful little book by Japanese Billionaire and Buddhist Priest Kazuo Inamori, A Compass to Fulfillment: Passion and Spirituality in Life and Business, and he tells a simple and powerful story. I'll retell it briefly in my own words.
A young Buddhist comes up to his priest and says, “Can you explain to me the difference between heaven and hell?”
The priest says, “Well, both places are a lot alike, as places. It’s the people that are different.”
“What do you mean?”
“Well in hell, people have all their meals at large round tables seating eight. They discover on arrival, to their surprise, that all the chopsticks are three or four feet long, and must be held in the proportionately normal place. When they dip into the big pot in the middle of the table to get their noodles, and try to eat, they find to their great frustration that the sticks are far too long and they can’t get the food to their mouths. They keep trying and failing, and it goes on and on. Everyone is starving and irritated and angry.”
“That’s awful.”
“Yes. Then, in heaven, the setup is the same, but the actions are quite different. Realizing what they’re confronted with, everyone there uses the long chopsticks to pick up the noodles and offer them to the person directly across the table, for their enjoyment. And that person does the same. Everyone feeds his neighbor and is fed by him, and a great and wonderful feast is enjoyed by all.”
Kindness is a connection that allows wisdom, virtue, and inner growth to flow in both directions.
When the powerful cease to care for the powerless, when the rich ignore the poor, the world has developed a malady of the very worst sort.
Kindness should be as natural as breathing. It should be our heartbeat, our DNA—not just a default, but a constant under all else.
Perhaps God made you big to help the very small. Or maybe you're now small to challenge and inspire the large. Either can be a blessing, and confer one, as well.
Only the confused are without compassion.
Love is giving more than getting. It can be wonderful, severe, and challenging. It's the work for which we're here. And it is its own reward.
There is a deep magic beneath the turbulent surface of the world. And in that underground stream, peace and power are to be found. The waters that flow there are those of love.
What you love will reveal you, and further form your soul. Therefore: Love the right things. Avoid the unworthy. Live with compassion.
When you love the right things, the right things will find you.
Am I centered enough, grounded enough, confident enough and strong enough to be kind? Those who aren't display these other deficiencies for all to see.
Any small act of kindness that I offer another person typically ends up doing me more good than it accomplishes for the recipient. It even seems to be the most reliable path to my own happiness. And in a world that seems not to value it nearly enough, it's simply the right thing, whenever possible, to do and to be.
Therefore, I hereby vow in any situation to think: How can I be kind?
I'm a fairly emotional person, but I've never teared up over a great business deal. I've smiled. I've laughed with pleasure. I may have gotten all tingly. But in such a setting, I've never had to rub my eyes or reach for a hanky. No tear has ever trickled down my cheek from the successful negotiation of a great contract or a big sale. And yet, I often get misty-eyed when I see other forms of human excellence. Why is this?
Just the other night on America's Got Talent, a show I haven't followed over the seasons, but that I happened to linger on while flipping channels, I had such an experience. A thirteen-year-old girl walked tentatively onto the stage and then amazed us all with her voice. Laura Bretan was cute, sweet, and humble in every way. And she looked so very young on that big platform. But her vocal abilities instantly took the audience to a new place. Everyone rose to their feet. It was almost a spiritual experience. Simon Cowell said that in all his years, he had never seen anything quite like it.
In case you missed the performance, it's well worth a few minutes on YouTube. And make sure the Kleenex is nearby, if you're at all like me.
Maybe I'm just an emotional mess. But, almost like Robert DeNiro's character in Analyze This, I tend to get weepy at certain things. I don't sob and honk my nose, but I feel the tear ducts awaken, and sense a moistness around my eyes. I may even get a little choked up. It's a bit harder to speak for few moments. I think my sensibilities are much more selective than DeNiro's were in the famous film. But they still range over many things. I get misty when I see real courage in action, and wonderful acts of kindness. I tear up at exceptional displays of human excellence when they rise above expectations and somehow capture elusive aspects of beauty or goodness. An example of self-giving love that's shown in extraordinary ways can get to me and move me deeply.
What touches us in such situations? It may be something that's deeply of the soul, or at the core of the human spirit—even something of virtue, in the classical sense. The Greek word ARETE (Aratay), which can be translated as excellence or as virtue, may come close to capturing at least part of it.
It's especially moving when ordinary people rise above our common experience and in their actions reflect something that's both high and deep, something truly inspiring that hints at perhaps why we're here, and what we're all supposed to be living in our own ways and with our own opportunities. It's as if these moments remind us of the special wonders and mysteries of life that the daily grind can hide from us. And thus, they speak to us. Yes, that's why we're here. Yes, there's real beauty. Yes, there's genuine love. Yes, there's much more out there, or in here, in our souls, for us to embrace and live and enjoy.
So the next time you see something that moves you and you reach for the Kleenex, remember that it can also be a moment to reach for the stars, and aim high in your own life, with your own talents and opportunities, and in your own potential impact on those around you. Let the moment reconnect you to something great and reinforce the best that's in you.
There's an old ideal that we seem to have forgotten throughout much of our culture. What I have in mind is maturity. Say the word now and people think: Senior Citizen, old age, wrinkles, slowing down, and worse. But it wasn't always that way.
Maturity. What is it? Actually, I think maturity is a quality, or characteristic comprised of many others, like, for example: Compassion, Kindness, Consideration, Equanimity or Inner Peace, Wisdom, Prudence, Perspective, Practicality, Honesty, perhaps a proper Awe regarding existence, and what some call "Hardihood" - the ability to persist in the face of difficulty, a capacity to endure hardship without constant complaint or a feeling of victimization. A mature person is not quick to anger. Such a person isn't careless with actions, thoughts, or feelings. Maturity rises to a level of appreciation and gratitude concerning all the good and beautiful things in life, while accepting the existence of limits and imperfections in the world. A mature person may want and work hard to change and improve the things around them, but they won't wallow in irritation, resentment, and frustration about those things that need changing.
For most of history, throughout most civilizations and societies, people have regarded maturity as something to aspire to, hope for, and respect. In past times, many would often actually try to act more mature than their age might indicate should be expected. That occasionally happens still, but in very limited contexts, as for example when someone is trying to get his or her first job. But immaturity, by contrast, now seems to nearly rule the culture. We see lots of people acting less mature than their age would lead us to expect. Turn on a reality TV show. Or consider standard political behavior. Or, you could just simply listen in on conversations in your favorite restaurant or bar.
The ancient philosopher Diogenes was said to walk around everywhere during the daytime, carrying a lighted lamp, or lantern. Asked what he was doing, he liked to say, "Looking for an honest man." In our own time, he would have nearly as endless a trek looking for real maturity.
A clarification is needed here. We're a youthful culture. We celebrate the young and a great many of the things that young people like. Many of us try to keep such things in our lives. And that can be very good. It's perfectly possible to be youthful without being immature. There's an important difference. I knew a famous scholar at Yale, a world renown historian, who at the age of 89 was stunningly youthful, and lots of fun, but not at all immature.
Immaturity is wrapped up in ego, a sense of entitlement, a lack of responsibility, and a tendency toward anger, as well as an inclination to delight in the flaws and sufferings of others. Immature people are prone to whining, resenting, and feeling slighted when others aren't suitably celebrating their specialness. Immature people throw fits and tantrums, regardless of age. They also tend to be as callous toward others as they are fragile in their own sense of need.
When you consider immaturity closely enough, you come to understand why its opposite was for so long an admired ideal. And it makes you wonder how we ever got so far away from an appreciation of what it is to be truly mature.
Maturity is about proper growth and exemplary health. We should encourage it in others and seek to enhance it in our own lives. If you disagree, that's perfectly fine ... for a poopie head.
How often are we tempted to pressure people to get better at what they're doing? How much do we actually do it? Maybe we push. Or we pull. We criticize and lay down the law. We demand. Some of us may even threaten. Well, not me. And, likely, not you. But it's too common, isn't it?
We want to get better, ourselves. We want to grow. And we want our kids, and our colleagues, and our employees, to get better, as well. But can we push and pull and force it?
Consider a garden. The plants aren't growing fast enough for you. You're wanting more. What are you going to do, grab them and pull? That's obviously not going to work. And it won't with people, either.
People grow best with friendly encouragement and guidance.
Yeah, I know. There are some people who don't respond to friendly encouragement or guidance. So why do you have anything to do with them? Move on. Or move them on.
Friendly encouragement is one of the best things we can give good people.
So: Encourage someone today. Help them fly higher.
What's more important, kindness, or respect? Are they equals, or is one subordinate to the other?
Ok, in case you're thinking "Who cares?" or "What difference does it make?" consider this: When you prioritize kindness in your dealings with others, you may act differently from what you would do if you prioritized respect. For example, many people often withhold what they consider to be difficult truths, or facts that might upset, frighten or worry a friend, or family member, or coworker, in an attempt to be kind. Late in the Harry Potter stories, Albus Dumbledore pretty much admits to Harry that one of his greatest mistakes was to do this and keep certain things from the young boy that he should have told him much sooner.
When we withhold difficult truths from someone who might genuinely want to know them, however hurtful or disturbing they might be, we are not respecting the other person as a mature spirit, or soul, capable of dealing with difficulty. We might say we're doing it to be kind. But we're not showing the ultimate of respect. When we truly respect another person, we tend to be more forthright and honest. We'll also certainly try to do this, to be truthful, with kindness, so it isn't a matter of choosing one rather than the other. But it's a matter of which guides which.
Think for a moment about the relationship of these two qualities, kindness and respect.
Kindness without respect is either paternalism, or is the mere outward appearance of the caring virtue and not its reality, but rather more a form of manipulation, or else a mere cultural habit to smooth out the bumps of human relations.
Respect without kindness can be a sort of formal and almost grudging sense of at least rough and partial equality in some crucial regard. But without the warming influence of true care, it's by itself rather cold.
The ideal, in my thinking, is to pair respect and kindness in our treatment of others, but with respect always being the senior partner, so to speak, or the priority, overall. Kindness is of infinite value, but is always to be felt, and shown, as a way of respecting another person. Respect is, in this perspective, always in the lead. So, if I'm right in this conclusion, and you think that withholding some crucial information from another person is indeed an act of kindness on your part, you should ask yourself whether it also, first and foremost, shows full respect to the other person, as an equally valuable and autonomous decision maker with a right to know anything that would impinge importantly on their lives, and able in their own way to handle their emotions and reactions to the truth.
At least, this is what I got in my last dip into a swimming pool. Sometimes, first thing in the morning, before the heat of the day, I'll get into the pool and move slowly back and forth in three to four feet of water, in a sort of zen walking meditation, and the other morning, while doing so, these were the thoughts that at one point spontaneously emerged. I hope they're right. Because of the priority of my respect for you, dear reader. Thanks for your own reflection on the matter.
I'd never read Truman Capote. It's hard to have grown up in the twentieth century and not have come across and read anything by him. But just the other day I picked up the Modern Classics book, A Christmas Memory, One Christmas, and The Thanksgiving Visitor, largely because I noticed it on a shelf in my house. He was an amazing writer.
In the story about Thanksgiving, the narrator is an eight year old boy who has been relentlessly and cruelly bulled by a twelve year old boy in his class, a young man who has failed grades, and comes from a background of failure. Our narrator, Buddy, lives with some older relatives, several sisters and a brother, in Alabama, and is closest with a lady in her sixties, Miss Sook, he calls her, who is in many ways like a child. Her simplicity causes her to favor the company of young children. But it also helps her to see deep truths that normal people would miss. This comes across in all three stories, and struck me deeply as I read.
Because of an act of kindness she does for Buddy's tormentor, the sort of favor he's never received from anyone, apparently, he changes. He becomes a better person, in contradiction to all his previous behavior. The story reminds us that almost anyone can be redeemed, or transformed. But it rarely happens apart from an act of love and kindness.
We tend to think in the opposite way, that bad people deserve bad consequences. But sometimes, a small act of acceptance, and respect, and care, can change a heart. The author Truman Capote suffered much in his life. And because of that, he has some lessons to pass on to the rest of us. Redemption is possible. Change can happen. But if it's radical enough, it has to be helped along by acts of love, which themselves are radical enough to make it happen.
Our lesson is simple. It's important to be able to rise above things, and even act in love toward someone who seems not to deserve it. That way, you just might help make something radically good happen.
One reader, a prominent surgeon on the west coast, recently asked me to ponder compassion. He asked, "Is it dead?"
When you read the papers and watch the news, it can certainly look dead. The world seems full of hatred, anger, mean-spiritedness, resentment, bitterness, and cries for revenge. Comb through reader comments online for mainstream media. You don't have to go find dark corners of the internet to come across streams of vitriol and out-of-control nastiness. It seems to be a vile current in which far too much of humanity swims.
The great physicist Stephen Hawking recently said that in his view the chief threat to the continuation of life on earth is human aggression. From embattled areas in the middle east to the street corners of US cities, and even in the executive suites of too many global companies, there is often far more aggression on display than kindness, goodness, and gentleness.
Where can compassion be found? Whether you find your greatest insight into human nature in the scientific story of evolution, or in religious diagnoses of our condition, one thing is clear: Self centeredness is the main theme, whether in biology or the Bible, and even in Buddhist texts. The struggle to survive in a challenging environment encourages a focus on the self and its needs, along with an aggressiveness in meeting those needs and defending against any threat. On the evolutionary accounts, all life becomes hardwired in self and survival. And such things as cooperation, collaboration, community, and finally compassion, all arise within close kin groups for the sake of greater survival chances. But outside those groups, these noble things can be hard to find. There are parallel religious accounts that cite a drive for independence, control, and self assertion as the key to our problems. And none of these conditions is conducive to compassion.
What is compassion? A fellow feeling that interprets love as kindness. It's etymologically a "feeling along with" another that sees the other's needs and wants, weaknesses, and hopes, aspirations and desires with understanding and acceptance that undergirds and contextualizes any difference or moral judgment.
Compassion puts itself into the place of another, and acts with loving understanding. Compassion moves out of the self and into a mode of helping, serving, and lifting up those who are in any sort of need. And we're all in some sort of need, aren't we?
Compassion is most often too quiet to gain wide notice, or the attention of the media. It still lives, and takes place each day, and in sometimes quite unexpected places. There are locales stridently hostile to it. And there are other domains where it flourishes. But it's still a part of the mix of our world. I see it often. And I remind myself now and then to be more attentive to how I might let it flow through me.
I bet you do, too. And of course, the less we see it, the more we need to be it.
In a world of bristling egos, kindness can sometimes seem as quaint as it is rare. We're in a hurry, and have to get things done. We confront obstacles, irritants, and demands. There's little time to pause and recognize a need and then go to the trouble of treating someone else kindly. As I've heard it asked, recently: "Who's got the bandwidth for that?"
We all do. And we ignore kindness to our own detriment. Whether you believe it's a quality that reflects our Creator, or you think it's a strange and wonderful anomaly in a universe of particles and energies, if you look deeply enough, you can see that it's a nearly magical elixir for great relationships and inner peace.
Do you want to get a lot done? Do you even aspire to the excellent, the exceptional, the extraordinary? Surround yourself with great people. And treat them with justice, fairness, and kindness. Truly great people will do the same thing, themselves. And your work together will flourish.
Kindness is the extra, supererogatory "beyond" - an overflow of goodness that takes place beyond the demands of duty, and occurs only as a manifestation of love. It plants the seeds of great relationships and then nurtures them into a full flowering. It resonates in the heart.
When you contrast the soul of an irate or callous individual with that of a person filled with kindness, you find a clash and disparity no greater than which can be conceived.
And here's a secret. Kindness toward others is, perhaps, the greatest form of kindness toward yourself. When peace is given, it grows within. When love is given, it grows within. The small kindnesses of life obey a mathematics not imagined by the unjust and surly among us. Their consequences multiply beyond any reasonable expectation. Those often quiet actions make for great business teams, sports organizations, schools, neighborhoods, and families. They are a hidden source of excellence in all our endeavors.
Kindness has power. And as one of Shakespeare's characters says about mercy, it's always twice blessed - it blesses him that gives and him that takes. And the great surprise is this. The more you give, the more then is given for you to take. That's the power of kindness.
This week, I've written an earlier blog post on the idea of greatness. A friend read it and told me something interesting. He said that his son had once been at a school where he was surrounded by mediocrity, and then switched to another school in the same town where he encountered the quest for personal greatness, left and right. My friend went on to say that the new, more challenging environment, had a decidedly uplifting effect on his son, right away, and that the results of this got him into a top university, where the level of expected excellence increased again.
It's amazing how often we've been told by philosophers that we become like the people we're around, and how commonly we forget to use this important truth to our own advantage. During my years at Notre Dame, it astonished me to see that, no matter how good our football team might be, when they played a bad team, they played badly themselves. The sloppiness and mistakes they showed could be truly perplexing to witness. And yet, when they played a top five team, they'd play them toe-to-toe, and often win.
We're so often like thermometers, rising or falling with the temperature around us, and yet we'd prefer to think of ourselves as thermostats, determining it, instead.
There are a lot of deep evolutionary reasons, related to survival, for our unconscious need and drive to fit in with the people around us. We need to be accepted. We need to be liked. And so, below the level of awareness, we conform in many ways. We become like our tribe.
But we also have the gift of free will. And that allows the possibility, within limits, and sometimes even apart from any limits, for us to choose our tribe. Who do we want to hang around? Who do we want to be like? Who do we most admire?
And yet, here's the apparent dilemma: I want to be like people who are a lot better than me. That way, I can grow into my own form of greatness, encouraged by my environment. But if they're at least as smart and ambitious as I am, they'll want to be around people much better than them, which clearly excludes me. Remember Groucho Marx, who said he'd never want to belong to a club that would have someone like him as a member? That's sort of the problem.
But there's the secret. If I want to be around people significantly better than I am in all the right ways, they will be people of great kindness and curiosity - two very different virtues. And yet, either of those qualities will open them up to my company. Problem solved.
So, why not aim for the stars? The real stars, I mean, not the fake, manufactured ones. When we associate with people of real wisdom and virtue, real accomplishment and knowledge, we're encouraged in our own adventures with greatness. The path is much easier.
Why, then, should we ever settle for less?
Kindness is something that, in small doses, can have big results.
Harshness is something that, in a glancing blow, can do great damage.
Full attention is a tremendous gift that we can give another person.
Inattention and indifference wound us deeply.
We were born to care, and to need care.
We should cultivate caring connections whenever we can.
The more we give, the more we get.
But we all know that. Yet, we often forget.
Every life is a doorway into the mysteries and depths of existence.
Every person bears witness to something vital.
When we treasure people more, when we live with kindness, we flourish.
