Almost a decade ago I bought a shelf sign that says “kindness matters”. It has sat on a cabinet in my kitchen ever since.
When I first bought that sign, I really wanted to embrace the thought and be as kind as I could to everyone all of the time.
Kindness does matter and living with kindness as a priority changed me.
It became easy to be generally kind. Over the years I became a teacher to my children instead of an authority figure.
I stopped demanding things from people and allowed them to live their life and journey in the way they wanted to.
I became responsible for myself instead of expecting others to be responsible for me.
I choose my words with care, I started making decisions when I felt neutral instead of emotionally charged, I learned empathy and vulnerability and compassion, and I consciously decided to be more thoughtful and generous.
When life is ok, it’s pretty easy to choose kindness.
The moments that truly define us are when life isn’t going as planned.
When we have been betrayed, or rejected, heartbroken or when we are afraid losing something… kindness still matters… but it’s a whole different level of hard. Those are the most critical moments to practice empathy, compassion, and kindness because those are defining moments.
It takes a tremendous amount of heart power, self control, and brain power to practice kindness when we are ego driven, in fight mode, or in self preservation … but these moments are equally as important to maintain our kindness priority.
If you want to level up your kindness meter, you need to bring it to every moment in your life, not just the easy ones.