Kindness actually lowers our blood pressure,
and it elevates our moods.
It leads to the release of chemicals
that help us to feel safer,
so we connect more easily to other people
and we're more cooperative.
Kinder people live longer.
In fact, the benefits of kindness are so powerful
that if we could distill them
and market them as a nutritional supplement,
we would all take it.
Kindness acts like salve
to soothe the scrapes and bruises of life.
And it's not just the recipient who benefits.
If you're kind to me, I'll benefit,
but you will equally benefit.
Both our brains will fire with powerful chemicals,
creating a biological win-win.
I've been reclaiming kindness in my own life
with a kindness practice
that I started about five years ago.
I was walking across campus one day
when I encountered a group of four young women
engaged in cheerful conversation,
and they unwittingly bumped into me
and they knocked me off the sidewalk.
They were so engaged with each other
that they barely noticed me,
even as they walked right into me.
I was already stressed, and this just made me mad.
But I didn't say anything.
I avoided.
And then I stewed.
I came up with snappy responses that I could have said,
and I kept myself upset for most of the day.
I knew I was being petty, and I started to imagine
the kind of life I was going to have if I kept this up.
A lonely and grumpy old woman,
surrounded by my family of cats...
[AUDIENCE LAUGHTER]
And I knew something had to change.
So I came up with a plan.
It was a solo plan, I launched it with no fanfare.
I came up with three words to add permanently
to the signature of all my outgoing emails:
Be kind. Always.
These words are aimed at others.
They need to be kind, always.
Well, my new signature does create a bit of a stir,
and people start to talk to me about kindness.
Like, I'm some kind of expert on the topic.
Be kind. Always.
It ends up that the words are kind of catchy,
and some people tell me they're using them
as a measure of their actions.
And though I hadn't intended that for myself,
I start to wonder about if I could.
Other people's incivility still peeves me,
but I start to get curious about my own.
And I think it might be kind of interesting
to be kind, always.
I start by bringing awareness to my email,
and to my driving,
and I strive to give up gossip.
And I find, by holding myself to this intention,
I do feel better.
I'm happier.
So I commit to a practice.
I am going to choose consciously to be kind, always.
But then, of course, I start to notice
all the times when I'm not kind.
I'm really committed to the practice.
And I've even learned to avoid less in my relationships.
So what happens to me when I'm unkind now,
I figure out that it's my thinking.
It's my judgments that trip me up.
This is something I actually learned about myself
back in elementary school.
In sixth grade, I worked in the school kitchen
to earn my lunches.
And in our school, we loaded the trays
full of food inside the kitchen
so a fully loaded tray would arrive
at a pickup window for each student,
with my job to scoop canned peaches onto every tray.
Nikki was a girl in my class.
She was heavy.
She was inconsistent about her hygiene.
She'd reached puberty early.
I just had an attitude about her.
So I calculated which tray was going to be hers,
and for three consecutive days
I scooped no peaches onto her tray.
I was picking on her.
So when my teacher took me aside,
I knew what she was going to talk about.
I was a good kid in general,
so I knew this was going to be about peaches.
My teacher's simple words have stayed with me.
Jamie, I know Nikki looks different,
but you're hurting her feelings.
Please, do what's right.
Well, my little sixth grade heart skipped a beat.
First off, my teacher didn't scold me. She was kind.
She took the time to step inside me
to understand my actions,
and then she took me inside Nikki
so I could understand hers.
And I was able to,
because my teacher's kindness had opened me.
Nikki and I didn't become friends,
but I always did scoop peaches onto her tray after that.
But most importantly, I stopped judging her,
and I started relating to her as another child just like me.
And I recognized that, like me, Nikki needed kindness.
On my journey to becoming kinder,
I've realized that unraveling judgment
is a monumental act of kindness.
It's monumental because it's very difficult,
especially when we're feeling righteous,
when our fight instincts surface and we feel entitled.
But we can.
It just takes a little effort to slow down some
and to consider that our thoughts are just judgments,
our judgments are just thoughts,
not even necessarily accurate.
And they can become lenses
through which we view others as opponents,
and maybe even treat them that way.
Alternatively, we can use a 'just like me' lens,
and through this softer lens, we can be reminded
that others are pretty much all the same, like us.
Equally human...
And we can understand each other.
We all make mistakes,
and cry,
and get impatient,
and bump into people on the sidewalk.
And we all open when we're treated with a little kindness.
I'm not suggesting here that we ignore incivility.
Quite the opposite, actually.
We can be strong and say and do whatever is needed,
but with kind intention.
One day on my way to work, a young man on a skateboard
jumped off the sidewalk right in front of my car.
I honked my horn, and he made it safely across the street.
I was expecting a humble, Sorry...
But this guy flipped me off.
I filled with indignant anger,
and I admit it, I had the thought,
I should have just hit him.
[AUDIENCE LAUGHTER]
But I'm already into my kindness practice a couple of years,
so be kind, always, comes to mind.
I find it's harder to be empathetic when I'm angry.
But I stay with it.
And I figure he was probably scared, just like me.
And I've had fear turn to anger before,
I know what that's like.
With that shift in my thinking, my anger softened.
And the truth is, I'm really glad this guy was not hurt.
I can feel that, and that feels good.
Kind...
Kindness is so powerful
that it can turn situations completely around.
And by choosing kindness, we can do this together.
We can start a kindness revolution, one situation at a time.
Thank you.
[APPLAUSE]