World Kindness Day:  13 November 2009

World Kindness Week:  9-15 November 2009

Random Acts of Kindness Week: 15-21February 2010

There is also plenty of popular writing on the benefits of kindness. British psychoanalyst Adam Phillips and British (Canadian-born) historian Barbara Taylor have written and interesting book in answer to the question, ‘Why should we be kind?’ Called, ‘On Kindness’, they say, “The pleasure of kindness is that it connects us with others; but the terror of kindness is that it makes us too immediately aware of our own and other people’s vulnerabilities. . . . particularly the vulnerability we call desire.’’ This is an interesting explanation as to why we enjoy kindness but sometimes find it hard to receive, and often procrastinate when considering offering kindness to others.

Kindness is also a hot topic for researchers. Otake, Shimai, Tanaka-Matsumi, Otsui & Friedrickson report in Happy People Become Happier Through Kindness: A Counting Kindness Intervention, that their most important finding was the close association between kindness and happiness in everyday life. They found that kind people experience more happiness and have happier memories. In a simply experiment where people counted acts of kindness for one week, they found people appeared to have become happier and more grateful. They conclude that happy people are more kind in the first place and that they can become even happier, kinder and more grateful by simply being kind to others.

If happiness is a result of being kind it is interesting to look at researcher, Sonja Lyubomirsky’s,  recent summary of the benefits of happiness. In “The How, What, When, and Why of Happiness,” Lyubomirsky summaries the results of over two hundred scientific studies on happiness and concludes, happy people:

Kindness has been written about by many people all over the world. Here are just a few quotes that inspire me:

• Do not let kindness and truth leave you; Bind them around your neck, Write them on the tablet of your heart – Proverbs 3:3
• Kind words can be short and easy to speak but their echoes are truly endless – Mother Teresa
• Kindness is the language which the deaf can hear and the blind can see – Mark Twain
• No act of kindness, no matter how small, is ever wasted – Aesop (620 BC – 560 BC), The Lion and the Mouse
• What is desirable in a man is his kindness, And it is better to be a poor man than a liar – Proverbs 19:22
• The ideals which have lighted my way, and time after time have given me new courage to face life cheerfully, have been Kindness, Beauty, and Truth. The trite subjects of human efforts, possessions, outward success, luxury have always seemed to me contemptible – Albert Einstein
• Forget injuries, never forget kindnesses – Confucius
• Recompense injury with justice, and recompense kindness with kindness – Confucius
• If you want others to be happy, practice compassion. If you want to be happy, practice compassion -The Dalai Lama
• Because judgment without kindness will be shown to anyone who has not been kind. Kindness triumphs over judgment! – James 2:13
• Yet do I fear thy nature; It is too full o’ the milk of human kindness – William Shakespeare (“Macbeth”, Act 1 scene 5)
• That best portion of a good man’s life, His little, nameless, unremembered acts of kindness and of love – William Wordsworth
• Kind words do not cost much. Yet they accomplish much – Blaise Pascal:
• A fellow who does things that count, doesn’t usually stop to count them – Albert Einstein
• But the fruit of the Spirit is love, joy, peace, patience, kindness, goodness, faithfulness – Galatians 5:22
• It is kind to be able to bear conflict, in oneself and others; it is kind, to oneself and others, to forgo magic and sentimentality for reality. It is kind to see individuals as they are, rather than how we might want them to be; it is kind to care for people just as we find them. This version of kindness accommodates ambivalence; it makes room for, and thereby transcends, frustration and hatred. It is the poet’s (or the novelist’s) version – Tolstoy, rather than Dr. Phil. In short, it’s human – Phillips & Taylor
• The true meaning of life is to plant trees, under whose shade you do not expect to sit – Nelson Henderson
• There is one word which may serve as a rule of practice for all one’s life: reciprocity – Confucius
• When we feel love and kindness toward others, it not only makes others feel loved and cared for, but it helps us also to develop inner happiness and peace – Dalai Lama
• You gave me life and showed me kindness, and in your providence watched over my spirit – Job 10:12
• The only way to tell the truth is to speak with kindness. Only the words of a loving man can be heard- Henry David Thoreau

We enjoy it when others are kind to us. Kindness is an important part of our relationships and wellbeing.

We also feel good when we are kind to others. Kindness can make a difference to how we develop our own lives.

Philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche argued that kindness and love are the “most curative herbs and agents in human intercourse.”

I am certainly grateful for all the people in my life who have been kind, even when I haven’t always shown kindness to them. To you I express my indebtedness for the kindness you give.  Me te mihi nui mo o manaakitanga, tena rawa atu koe – in appreciation of your kindness, many thanks.

I encourage you to give kindness a go. Even if you don’t feel up to it, or are longing for someone to show you kindness, I encourage you to be kind to others. Keep being kind and watch what happens.

It is my hope that the ideas and resources in this blog inspire kindness in you.