Kindness Matters

Mood Music: Love’s in Need of Love Today by: Stevie Wonder

Some days we get so caught up in handling and managing everything that needs to be done, we forget what the heart is missing… Then from nowhere, someone opens a door for us, picks up the keys we dropped, offers a hug, or a compliment and we get a peculiar feeling.

The feeling that the roughness has been taken off the edges of our souls and a little part of our resolve becomes undone.

You might feel the sensation of butterflies in your stomach and on a particularly rough day your knees might even buckle.

Kindness. Lord, is it missing in the world today.

Sometimes we lead such solitary and goal originated lives that many of our needs go unchecked. The base need for kindness and caring is usually the last thing attended to.

The weirdest thing happened to me last winter at my local grocery store. I was in a harried frenzy trying to load all the things I had brought for an event I was hosting, later that evening, onto the conveyer belt.

It had been a very long and stressful week and there was still a million other things that needed to be done to cater to the needs of my guests. I was really struggling to load my things, gather my thoughts, and rally my mind around the very expensive total ensuing.

Now mind you, I have frequented this grocer about once a week for about three years and the following has never happened: the bag boy pulled the shopping cart away from me and silently began loading my groceries onto the conveyer belt for me. I think he registered the panic on my face and wanted to help

. In case I never told you- but I intend to explain my reasoning in a future post-I have a thing with hands (and eyes) and the deft and care I saw in his fingers as he loaded my items almost made me come apart right there by the cash register.

Some days we are doing all we can to live through to the next few hours. We all are living with personal scars and issues. The kindness of others is a temporary blanket that covers us from the frigidness of the world and occasionally our own thoughts.

Kindness silently says to a person that you are not invisible and your griefs and cares matter to someone other than yourself.

So the next time you see someone struggling with groceries think of this story and extend a hand.

The next time you see someone with rounded shoulders, offer a gentle touch or a hug. With all that you do, remember that your kindness might be the thing that keeps someone from hurting, if only momentarily.

In an age where we are all hashtagging whose life matters most, remember that at the end of the day kindness matters more than anything in the world.