If being kind doesn’t come easy to you or if you feel this nagging thought that you should be kinder, I might know what your issue is. Let me explain a recent epiphany of mine and perhaps it might strike a chord with you:
Throughout my life I’ve always thought, “I must work harder at being a better, kinder person.” Or I’d think, “I should give more to charity or do some volunteer work.” I must and I should… hmmmmm? Shouldn’t giving be natural – shouldn’t I just want to do it? More ‘should’s’!
I’m not a mean person at all but I can’t say that I’ve been naturally kind either. Why is that? Was I born a bad egg?
Looking back over my life, when I did give kindness I usually had an ulterior motive. I might give my husband more attention than usual, but I’d be buttering him up for my request to have a girls only weekend away. Sometimes I used kindness to get what I wanted and other times I used it as a weapon. For example, I would ‘kill people with kindness’ – those that were mean or rude. And while I’m thinking of it…I would also deploy ‘Kind Kim’ out of a sense of duty. If there was an elderly person or pregnant woman, I would hold the door for them. I didn’t do it to be kind; I did it to follow the ’rules’ of belonging to a social society.
I didn’t know what it felt like to be kind for the sake of just being kind.
When you don’t know what you don’t know…you just don’t know it. I grew up in an atmosphere where guilt and manipulation ran the family. I was taught by my role models to get as much as you can from as many people as you can. Scarcity was rampant – we had no money…life’s a bitch and then you die.
This whole kindness thing was something I read about in books. Out of the thousands of self-help and spiritual books I’ve read I kept coming across guru’s spouting out that ‘what you give out, you get back.’ I read over and over that the key to happiness is to give unconditionally. ‘Unconditionally’ – well, how the heck was I supposed to figure out how to do that?
So this is where all the ‘shoulds’ and ‘must-do’s’ came in. For years I would force myself to be kind and pretend there was no other motive…but I certainly had a motive. My motive was that if I give I’ll get something back.
Recently I had my “ah-ha” moment about giving. The penny has finally dropped. I found the missing piece of the puzzle.
You can’t give kindness ‘unconditionally’ if you are not first and foremost kind to yourself.
This has been a massive learning experience for me. All my life I thought that everyone had ulterior motives to being kind and I was just like everyone else. I thought that that was the way the world worked. I thought that being kind was about doing what you should do…not doing something that came naturally.
Since I’ve left the corporate world, enrolled in weekly therapy, started meditating every day and have opened my heart to a better way of enjoying the journey miracles have happened.
I discovered that I had a relationship with myself. That alone still freaks me out. When you beat yourself up or berate yourself for making mistakes, that’s you talking to you. All day, every day, we talk to ourselves and most of us are not very nice. Well…I was not nice to me at all – I told myself I was worthless, ugly, unlovable, stupid (you get the picture).
Through my transition away from a predominantly work-focused life, I not only realised I had a relationship with myself, but I’m proud to announce that me and me are very happy with each other now. I actually love myself. (Yes…saying that kind of thing does make me feel a bit silly, but that’s okay!)
And because I patched things up with me, I’ve been so kind to myself. Rather than work 80 hours/week, I work 20 now. Instead of working on projects that I don’t like, I only say yes to work that has purpose and value to me. Rather than avoid breakfast, I take the time to nourish my body. Instead of drinking wine too often I now have it on special occasions or when I feel like a treat. Rather than put work first I now put me and my family/friends as top priority. (This paragraph could go on and on…the changes in my life have been unbelievable).
I’ve discovered that when you have a good relationship with you, you want to take care of you. I didn’t know how to do that. And if I wasn’t kind to me, how could I possibly understand what the guru’s were talking about when they said, ‘kindness is the only way?’
So…if you think you ‘should’ be a kinder person perhaps you need to start with being kinder to you first. From what I’ve experienced thus far, the kinder I am to me, the more my kindness seems to spread to everyone else around me. And the great thing about ‘Kind Kim’ now is that I genuinely enjoy being kind for absolutely no reason.
Amen.
