The Harder Path of Kindness

Human kindness has never weakened the stamina or softened the fiber of a free people. A nation does not have to be cruel to be tough.

Franklin Delano Roosevelt

Cruelty tries to mimic strength. But it is a hollow brand of strength, an overreach, a compensation for the fears that eat us from inside. True strength comes from a deeper source.

Kindness does not accumulate by addition, tallying by ones; it multiplies, doubling as it goes. Each act of kindness has more positive impact on our moral psyche than an act of mean-spiritedness can detract.

I know this from the compass in my bones. I feel contracted and repulsed when I see cruelty, or when my anger pushes me toward cruelty. I feel open and alive when I receive or give a kindness. Research confirms my intuition. Clinical studies show that witnessing an act of generosity lifts our mood and increases the likelihood that we will act with kindness.

It is easy to view kindness as an act of volition that comes from my separate self, but I feel it more as a feature of the universe that is always available, naturally arising, flowing outward, seeking the widest possible landscape. This universal kindness has its own peculiar gravity; it wants to include us and carry us along. Our choice is whether to align with it or not, and when we do, the surge of energy makes us bigger.

Societies and nations also choose whether to align with kindness or cruelty, swinging back and forth through the circumstances of history. We are in a time when anger and fear consume our attention, and our leaders have fallen victim to our collective anxieties, opting for the false strength of cruelty. This does not make us tough, it makes us small.

We don’t have to accept this, we can speak out against actions that violate our values. But we must not let our indignation lead us to match the vicious stroke for stroke. We are stronger when we are not pulled toward cruelty ourselves, when we align with kindness, the basic principle that makes us human. It’s a harder path, designed for hardy souls. And walking the harder path builds greater strength in me to witness pain, bear it, and still greet the world with a generous, open hand.

It is not enough for me to fight cruelty by addition, reciprocating tit for tat. I want to be a multiplier of well-being.

Photo by Il Vagabiondo on Unsplash