Transcriber: Hallie Lawson Reviewer: Keira White
People tend to underestimate kindness.
It’s become somewhat of a cliché nowadays,
appearing on T-shirts and social media hashtags
as a way of promoting that message alongside your image.
There’s nothing inherently wrong with that, of course,
but the question is, can people live up to making the world a kinder place?
Do they understand exactly how pressing this need is?
[Kindness is an action.]
There’s a common misconception
that kindness is a quality or an attribute,
but in reality, kindess should be a verb.
There is nothing passive about being kind.
Kindness is a choice, and it’s one we must practice making.
In fact,
choosing kindness is the most valuable and courageous action there is.
And I’ll tell you why:
I myself have “be kind” as my bio on social media,
and I wear the phrase each day;
I wear this necklace every day and I have for the past few years of my life.
It’s a simple necklace, just a leather cord, little blue flower,
with two words inscribed: be kind,
but it’s so much more than just a piece of jewelry to me.
It’s a piece of my story, a piece of my hometown
and a piece of my heart.
It's a reminder of what's most important to me.
And when other people see it,
I hope it’s a reminder of the importance of being kind.
I grew up in a suburban New England town in the American state of Connecticut.
It was gorgeous in the fall,
but otherwise quite a quiet place to grow up.
I loved my primary school.
I have so many nostalgic memories,
from crafting misshapen clay figurines in art class,
to naming the school’s new turtle,
who still welcomes visitors to the school today.
When I attended school there, I learned everything from how to read,
to how to respect people.
It was a magical place to me,
and it felt like nothing could ever go wrong there,
but on December 14th 2012
my memories of Sandy Hook Elementary School were tainted.
It became known as the site
of one of the most gruesome acts of gun violence in American history;
20 first grade children, most of them only six years old,
and six educators were killed in a mass shooting
that took everyone by surprise.
Needless to say, my town was completely shattered as a result.
Facing such a loss was devastating.
It was hard to stomach the reality of what had happened,
and it felt impossible to have faith in the world ever again.
About a year later, I began really struggling,
but I internalized my pain because I thought
if I admitted what I was going through,
I’d take away attention from people who would need it more.
In a way, I was right, paradoxically
because I’m pretty sure everyone around me was feeling the same way.
When there’s a traumatic event of such large proportions,
I feel like it’s expected that communities will unite through their grief,
but I found that grief was driving us apart.
While my community attempted to pick up the pieces after the shooting,
an organization called Ben’s Bells came to town.
It’s the same organization that made my necklace,
and it’s mission is to spread kindness.
They make these handcrafted bells, and they hide them around town,
and when you find one, it’s yours to keep.
It may not seem like much, but in those days
it was like finding a small miracle.
In those days, we needed all the reminders we could get
that there was still good out there in the world.
It was these bells and a million other acts of kindness
that helped my community get through,
and it taught us that even seemingly insignificant acts
can really make a difference.
Soon, there was a revolution of kindness in my town.
It wasn’t uncommon to go pay for your coffee,
only to find that the stranger in front of you already had it covered.
There were new community initiatives to raise money for people in need
or to donate to the local food bank.
The people in my community fell in love
with this concept of random acts of kindness,
not only because we received so much joy out of benefiting from them,
but also because we found that it was healing
to consciously perform acts of kindness.
Most people in my community fell in love with the idea
of random acts of kindness,
not only because we got so much joy from receiving them
but also because we found that consciously deciding
to perform kind acts was healing.
The truth is, kindness is a choice.
Sandy Hook may never fully heal from the shooting,
but we’ve learned to look past
our pain, our fear, and our anger.
To instead embrace generosity and compassion,
and let me tell you, it feels impossible until it’s done.
This is true, regardless of the circumstance,
and everything we do, we can make a difference.
The choice is there to pick kindness,
whether it’s paying for a stranger’s coffee,
forgiving a loved one,
or simply doing something nice for yourself.
Every day we can choose to be kinder.
Multiple studies have looked into the benefits of choosing kindness.
For instance, kindness increases happiness.
A 2006 study by Otake and their colleagues found an increase in subjective happiness
of participants when they were asked to count
their acts of kindness for a week.
It also led to an increase in kindness and gratefulness.
Rowland and Curry agreed in 2017,
but they also found that this increase in happiness
was not affected by the strength of the relationship
between the giver and the receiver of the kind action
or, whether it was to yourself, or even if you simply witnessed a kind act.
Interestingly, a 2018 study by Chancellor and their colleagues
of a Spanish workplace revealed more about the nature of kindness;
they divided their participants into three groups:
givers, receivers and control.
Only the givers received instructions,
and that was to perform five acts of kindness for the receivers
over the course of four weeks.
They found mutual benefits for both givers and receivers,
including short term benefits,
such as an increase in competency and autonomy in the workplace,
long term benefits,
such as increase in life satisfaction and happiness after two months.
Sounds pretty great, right?
But that’s not the only thing they found;
another benefit was that they inspired others to act with kindness.
Receivers paid forward their kind acts
with 278% more kind and prosocial behavior
than controls, 278%.
That goes to show that kindness is contagious.
One of the few times this year that contagion is actually a good thing.
So how can we remember to choose kindness?
It’s simple.
Just like with any other skill, we must practice.
According to Dr David Hamilton,
who writes extensively on the topic of kindness,
our brains are already wired to be kind,
but we can further rewire them when we make kindness a habit.
Just like learning a new language or instrument,
we can build new neural networks when we practice kindness.
There are already many studies looking into how we can actively teach
kindness and empathy to children,
but people of any age can learn.
And why take my word for it when you can test it out yourself?
By performing one act of kindness,
whether it’s getting someone flowers
or simply writing a heartfelt thank you note.
And psychology tells us that we should share our journey of practicing kindness
with others because of something called the bandwagon effect.
The bandwagon effect is the idea that people adopt certain styles,
behaviors and attitudes, simply because everyone else is doing it.
So while it may seem odd to publicize your acts of kindness,
you’re actually inspiring other people to join you, setting off a ripple effect.
This is exactly the kind of ripple effect we need in our community,
whether it’s because of the Corona crisis,
or because of politics,
or because of more personal circumstances,
there is a lot of pain in the world.
If we want to have any hope to heal, we must actively practice kindness.
After all, you never know how you could be changing
the course of somebody's day.
Each year, as the anniversary of the shooting approaches,
my community takes part in an initiative called 26 Acts of Kindness
as a way to lessen our pain.
For the 26 days leading up to the anniversary,
we consciously perform an act of kindness in name of one of the victims,
to honor them.
Although December brings a lot of complex emotions to Sandy Hook,
we consciously turn towards kindness.
The truth is
kindness is courageous.
It’s difficult to find the good in the world,
but to become the good in the world is true bravery,
regardless of the circumstance.
It shouldn't take a tragedy to learn how important it is to be kind.
Try it yourself, consciously perform one act of kindness in the coming week,
and just see how it goes.
I'd like to leave you with the motto of Sandy Hook Elementary School,
something I grew up saying:
“Think you can, work hard,
get smart, be kind.”
Thank you.