The past few years have tried our patience and faith in our fellow Americans. It’s been a hard couple of years with a pandemic, shutdowns, job losses, and not to mention an attempted coup d’etat! People are angrier, but things are getting better. Sure we have problems like a war in Europe, inflation, and the virus is still hanging around. But the other day I stopped in Aldi’s where I just needed two boxes of corn flakes and a loaf of bread. And what happened next surprised me with an unexpected random act of kindness.
There was only one person ahead of me around six p.m. on Sunday. A young man around thirty looked back at me. I don’t know what he saw on my face when turned, but he told the clerk ringing his order to go ahead and pay for my stuff as well. It was only about $4 worth of groceries, but that considerate gesture was so nice! Occasionally you hear about random acts of kindness on television, but I have never had something like that happen to me before. As strange as it may sound, this act came after a really rough day. I wish the man has some good luck for his thoughtfulness in brightening a stranger’s day and I will never forget that selfless act just to make someone else feel good as long as I live.
I was as guilty as the next person feeling distrustful of people given the state of our country and the way people act. A simple act of random kindness was a treat for me that gives more hope about the fact that there is still so much good in people.
We should all try acting kinder to others. The golden rule really is what we should all do. Treat others as we ourselves would like to be treated. It’s like goodwill for a business. It takes years to acquire the goodwill of your customers, but a bad incident or two can ruin it quickly. And we are doing this to ourselves. We are letting our biases and political views control our lives too much.
Hate like the kind we see among the political tribes we live in is what can quickly turn into a cancer of our emotional souls. This destructive emotion will eat you alive and just cause more stress. Furthermore, stress is a killer and linked to physiological components like raising your blood pressure.
Kindness can spread though. Did you ever notice how good you feel when you help someone solve a problem or just give them a compliment? You get that “high” from being kind and their response to the other person boosts your own happy hormones such as serotonin, dopamine and the release of endorphins at the same time. Just like a disease, a random act of kindness can be contagious once it is passed on to spread as another and then another pay it forward.
Hate is a powerful thing. It’s empowering and washes away failures by shifting blame to others who may have nothing to do the problem.
Kindness and love have to compete against hate and I hope hate loses. Who needs hate anyway?
Hate only brings you an ulcer or the alienation of others. What good is that? Just be kind and let some sunshine into others’ lives is really the only way to live!
via beauty cooks kisses
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