Kindness for me is compassion, kindness is love, kindness is being empathetic and generous knowing we all do not have equal opportunities at life.
Kindness is walking a mile in the next person’s shoe before passing judgement. Kindness is tolerance, kindness is being supportive, kindness is the oneway VISA that can get us through any circumstance, the all purpose elixir that can aid us in overcoming anything. Kindness is strength.
I could go on and on because it’s an endless meaning. In a situation where you can be anything, just be kind and see how everything will turn out and possibly work in your favor.
HOW DO I EXPERIENCE KINDNESS
Some people think that generousity encompasses just money. For me, it goes beyond finance. We can be generous with our time, we can be generous with our wisdom. Infact, anything that we give out freely and willingly that makes life easy for the next person is generosit and that gives birth to kindness in the grand scheme of things. I experience kindness when the next person's actions is uplifting especially to my well being.
If I get in a tight fix and I get someone always calling and checking up on me then I get another person who sends me money, I’ll rate all their actions the same because it is the thought, time and effort you put in that counts for me not really how you do what you do to improve my situation.
Earlier this year I had run into a huge financial debt because of a situation I had and all my savings got exhausted, so I reached out to few friends for financial and emotional support. But guess what? The ones that I could take a bullet for left me hanging. They called once and promised to call back but they never did till date. Now, It is the people I least expect that kept reaching out to know how I’m faring and I'm still doing till date.
The fact that this people genuinely care to spare some of their time to be sure I’m ok made everything I was going through easy to overcome. I felt loved, I felt cared for. As for the people who let me down when I needed them the most I cut them off, I need room for people I can genuinely count on that will reciprocate my kindness. I was discussing this with a friend when I told him I cut so many people off this year, he asked why and further probed and asked, is it because they did not send you money when you were financially stranded?
His utterances shocked me, then I asked him did you send me money? He responded no, did I cut you off? He also responded No.
There was a long silence then he went Why did you cut them off?
I made him understand that I did not feel their kindness, I did not feel their love and I did not feel that they care. Even when I tried to reach out to them in my predicament to know if they were ok, they treated me with disdain having fulfilled my part to still reach out and they stylishly brushed me off, I did not feel the need to still keep such people around.
My friend replied: If you had reached out to them to know what's wrong why they went cold on you and they brushed you off then your action to cut them off is very valid.
HOW I SHOW KINDNESS TO OTHER PEOPLE
The biggest act of kindness for me and how I express it to others is rendering selfless service.
Showing kindness is giving of myself to people who cannot possible pay me back. It makes the show of kindness much genuine and void of ulterior motives in my own opinion.
I actually feel activities are more enjoyable going all out and giving my best without expecting a reward and then if I did get a reward it becomes more valued.
**HOW IMPORTANT IS KINDNESS TO ME? **
Kindness is a morale booster for me, so it's pretty much a motivation to do better. It's one of the most important things for me and the moment its lacking I'm withdrawing into my shell.
The only reason I am able to find my away around hive up to this point is because of the kindness hovering the blockchain. There's always someone to encourage you and assure you that you are doing great even when you are not sure of the next bend or the next step to take.
Knowing fully well that it's ok to make mistakes without being judge removes that fear and restrictions for me to express myself. I don't think I'd be able to achieve anything in life or pull through without a show of kindness.
In my darkest moment, knowing that people are cheering because they care and want to see me win, is all the motivation that I need to excel.
The number one thing that will never make sense to me in this life is conflict (Wars), especially knowing fully well that it will always end at the negotiation table. So why can't both parties be kind enough to just talk things through and reach a compromise? Why do they need to take the hostile amd destructive route first? and then I realized the reason is because we do not have enough kindness to go round.
@brijwhiz once responded to my comment on his post in kindness community that, most people want to feel macho as the dominant mentality is that being kind is perceived as weakness which would lead you to being taken advantaged of. This is a very wrong notion that needs to be fixed if we want to have a sustainable future because kindness is the only thing that can preserve that.
Without kindness, the world will not be safe to live in.