ACCEPTANCE
When I think about kindness, I think about consideration for others, letting people in line on the freeway, letting people pass in front of me at a restaurant, smiling at service personnel, in general trying to be nice to the people I encounter. But lately, I've also been thinking about how many people are unable to accept kindness. People who don't accept the space I make for them on the freeway or street, who don't accept the invitation to walk ahead of me at a restaurant, who seem to expect some hidden motive for being nice. Why is it so hard for people to accept that someone wants only to be nice to them, that there are no hidden motives, that I don't want anything from them?
I've concluded that my hopes for more kindness in the world are not being fulfilled at the pace I expected, that kindness must be so rare that people don't recognize it, that people are so cynical that they can't accept kindness when it is offered. It appears that people can't trust one another enough to even respond positively to kind gestures. This mistrust challenges my approach to problems, it suggests that kindness is not enough. What to do?
We can't let this failure of trust defeat us. We must accept that kindness will eventually be recognized and accepted for what it is. We can't abandon our efforts to be nice because some people are afraid we're trying to do something malign. We can't let others' fears change our behavior. Instead, we must redouble our efforts, expand our kindness to reach more people. For people to get used to kindness, we must be even kinder and more explicit. Make exaggerated signals for people to enter your lane on the freeway, repeat kind words until they're heard and believed, smile until you're sure the smile is noticed. We must accept that building trust by our kindness will be more difficult than we thought and not lose heart. Kindness can still change the world, but it may take a little longer than we thought.
2-28-00