you might think about kindness as being
this quite soft fluffy wishy-washy thing
but actually is really fundamental to
how we connect with each other
i think being kind is part of the
purpose of being alive
acts of kindness are needed in the world
right now more than ever
[Music]
back in 2011 i was sitting in a cafe
just enjoying a breakfast
i looked up at the screen and there was
a double decker bus on fire in london
it was terrifying it looked like civil
war
and it was a very negative response to
the riots that really upset me as well
i'd felt increasingly despairing about
what felt like the enormity of the
problems of the world i didn't know what
i could do
[Music]
and he was overwhelmed with gratitude it
was disproportionate to my tiny amount
of time and money
like i thought i did kind of put a smile
on his face that sort of did make a
difference
so as i was going home i concocted this
foolhardy notion that i was going to try
and do active kindness every single day
for a stranger for a year
it was completely life transforming
[Music]
it's one of the big paradoxes of
kindness that an act of kindness that is
intended to benefit others actually has
some positive consequences for yourself
there are patterns of activation in the
brain which correspond to a boost to
well-being the reward pathways in the
brain are activated when people are
performing kind acts
[Music]
those relationships that are required
for working cooperatively are founded
upon basic social connections
so it's pretty fundamental to how human
beings interact with each other
thank you so much that's really kind of
you
uh oh yes so over the course of the year
it proved itself to be utterly
heartwarming completely terrifying
occasionally expensive sometimes
physically hazardous like when i carried
some really heavy shopping over four
miles to a ladies flat so it was a
really sort of creative journey that was
also tiring and incredibly inspiring
[Applause]
[Music]
i was like high every day right mostly
it was kind of a warm glow around your
heart and also your tummy
so just felt really good
human beings have a predisposition to
exhibit kindness to other people
but they also have the possibility of
demonstrating quite significant
unkindness to other people the
environment makes a huge difference
all of those stories about kindness
being weak we have to challenge those
now
when you think of a really successful
person do you think of someone who's
kind or do you think of someone who's
out there in the limelight really
dominant figure a celebrity who's very
wealthy
what can we do to turn the narrative of
success around so he said actually being
successful does involve positive
relationships with other people
[Music]
this is one of my favorites
some old people dancing i just thought
about how elderly people had no contact
be on the walls of their care homes what
started off as quite a small localized
idea just became something way bigger
than i could ever imagined it's reached
over 250 schools and over 250 care homes
and positively impacted thousands of
people what we witnessed during that
time was how much we earn to help each
other what we have to do now
is remember
the immense kindness that we were
capable of during those times
this can't simply be a matter of
instructing people in a given setting to
be kind hey you you need to be kind
we need to change our environment so
that it feels normative to be kind
i would really like to see businesses
schools hospitals all public services
have a kindness manifesto so that they
all ask themselves is this kind so that
it becomes an ordinary part of our
conversation at every level in every
organization everywhere
[Music]
the biggest lesson for me was
to embrace the fact that every single
day i can do something that thing might
be just saying good morning to someone
that thing might be just smiling
that's how we change the world if you
carry out a good deed to someone else
that will increase their chance of them
carrying out kind of deeds to other
people so it kind of goes in a circle
kindness
the small stuff may actually be the big
stuff all those small things that you
think well they're not important it's
just people being nice to each other
maybe that's the most important thing
for creating an environment which
actually
enables people to feel good and to be
able to work together and to be able to
take on some really big challenges in
the same way that a beach is filled with
a
billion grains of sand
there's a sort of beautiful humility in
saying i can at every single moment at
any point of any day contributes to
making the world a better place
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