The Meaning of Kindness

"In a world where you can be anything, be kind."

My heart still aches as I am writing this, but the residue are helping me to put things in perspective. So here goes. In the course of the past 5 years, being here in the United States have taught me that kindness truly is not a value being taught in our education nor practiced more of in our society. I have met some of the most unkind people I could possibly imagine here, and being so far away from home, I feel hopeless and sad. But every time I feel my emotions deeply, I ask them why, why am I feeling this way? What is this trying to teach me? Do I loose hope in humanity? Do I loose hope in the word: Love? Do I stop loving and being kind? Do I stop believing in God? The answer is No. No matter what happens to me, I cannot stop being kind, and I cannot stop living my life without wearing my heart on my sleeves. Then what can I do about it, when people are unkind?

I learned that people can only meet us as deep as they have met themselves. We are sometimes blinded by the fact that, to have depth, we have to travel to the darkest corners of our soul, and truly reflect upon who we are. We can always find tons of excuses to not see it, to avoid it, and blame that things are happening because other people are making things difficult for us. We can always use excuses to be unkind, and unkindness is not necessarily saying things to hurt others or physically hurt others or being mean. Unkindness could be when someone desperately needed your help, and you neglect to see it and push it away so that other people could deal with it. Unkindness could mean you would rather choose what benefit you, what makes it easier for you, than to put down everything and help those who are in need. Unkindness could be judging, and jumping into conclusions about people, and not giving them a second chance when they needed it the most. Unkindness could be choosing what makes you feel good, and neglecting other people's boundaries.

When all hopes fail and I thought no one could ever understand nor try and help, the people whom I never thought would be able to help, actually reached out to help. In my surprise, I later found out, all these people who reached out to help are in fact in so much pain and am going through something far worse than I am. Such as a lost of a love one, getting over grief, having trouble in their lives... but when I asked them for help, they didn't push me away. They didn't give me a lecture, or try to convince me to "hang in there", or to use their own personal experience as an example to make themselves feel better. In fact, they put down their pain and reached out with their hands, with their actions, with their warmth, holding, comforting, and encouraging me in ways to give me hope again, giving me direction and guiding me, while giving me space to make informed decisions. I finally realized, kindness is a choice. It is somewhat a very tough choice, because it requires you to completely put yourself in another person's shoe, and have the compassion and empathy to understand what another person is going through. We all have a choice to choose to be kind no matter what is happening to us. And we choose to be kind whether we have a religion or not. It is not something we learn from Church, it is something we do because we choose to do it, and also because we believe in Kindness.

And when I think about my own faith, as a Christian, I often times wonder what does it really mean to be a follower of Christ? And it dawned on me that, kindness is the essential backbone teachings of Christianity. Christianity is not a religion base on a book. We don't read the Bible inside out and memorize everything without actually practicing it. We don't preach with our words, we set examples to disciple those who needed guidance. My mother always says, we don't read the Bible, we do the Bible. This is exactly the point. We transform the scriptures we study so hard for, into real life practices. And the impact these practices are on those who need it will reap the benefits most, and will receive the light that they need the most in their darkness.

Christianity is a spiritual experience and faith that teach the teachings of Jesus. Jesus is kind to those who needed His help, but He is also kind to those who are struggling, those who hated Him, and those that are the most troublesome. He never abandons anyone just because they are difficult. He would let go of the 99 sheep just to go find that 1 that is lost. He is love and He is kind. And even if it's not Christianity that you believe in, other religions and faith or even yourself as a human being, we are all spiritual beings of emotions and feelings, and we all can practice empathy to ourselves and those around us, no matter how inconvenient and no matter how difficult.

Life is difficult. Life is inconvenient. Life is definitely not perfect. Sometimes you feel things are coming to you like waves, one thing after another. But what defines you, is not what happens to you. The only freedom that one can choose, is the choice to be kind, to be compassionate, to be empathetic, and to choose love.

For this Thanksgiving, I am grateful for this priceless education and experience of what Kindness truly means. May you too find kindness in the most unexpected places~

With lots of love,

Ama