…is February 17. We talked about kindness to self on Monday, so this seemed only fitting. You may have read the piece below before. I was given this by my therapist, but have seen it quoted several times since then.

A Random Act of Kindness is not doing something nice for a family member or friend, even though those are wonderful things to do. A RAOK is done for someone you don’t know and may never meet. It can be anonymous or you can give it to/do it for them yourself. We do this every year on Whitten’s birthday, because of a quote I found in his papers.

Maybe you can try to do a little something for someone tomorrow!

My friend Elizabeth Childrey, who lost her sweet daughter Kate in 2017, has a great site called Kindness For Kate. They raise money for KATE (Kind Acts Touch Everyone) Benches for schools all throughout Virginia. They have, to date, donated 72 benches to schools all over the state. They are buddy/friendship benches, places that a child who is lonely can go sit, so that another child can go offer a kind hand in friendship. It is good work they are doing, help out if you feel so inclined!

I couldn’t have said the following any better myself, so I will quote it for you. And if you have read it before, I urge you to read it again. What could it hurt to be reminded?

“The day my father died, I was at the grocery store buying bananas. I remember thinking to myself, “This is insane. Your dad just died. Why the hell are you buying bananas?”

But we needed bananas - so there I was.

And lots of other stuff still needed doing too so over the coming days I would navigate parking lots, wait in restaurant lines, and sit on park benches; pushing back tears, fighting to stay upright, and in general always being seconds from a total, blubbering, room-clearing freak out.

I wanted to wear a sign that said: I JUST LOST MY DAD. PLEASE GO EASY.

Unless anyone passing by looked deeply into my bloodshot eyes or noticed the occasional break in my voice and thought enough to ask, it’s not like they’d have known what was happening inside me or around me. They wouldn’t have any idea of the gaping sinkhole that had just opened up and swallowed the normal life of the guy next to them in the produce section.

And while I didn’t want to physically wear my actual circumstances on my chest, it probably would have caused people around me to give me space or speak softer or move more carefully - and it might have made the impossible, almost bearable.

Everyone around you; the people you share the grocery store line with, pass in traffic, sit next to at work, encounter on social media, and see across the kitchen table - are all experiencing the collateral damage of living. They are all grieving someone, missing someone, worried about someone. Their marriages are crumbling or their mortgage payment is late or they’re waiting on their child’s test results, or they’re getting bananas ten years after a death and still pushing back tears because the loss feels as real as it did that first day.

Every single human being you pass by today is fighting to find peace and to push back fear; to get through their daily tasks without breaking down in front of the bananas or in the carpool line, or at the post office.

Maybe they aren’t mourning the sudden, tragic passing of a parent or child, but wounded, exhausted, pain-ravaged people are everywhere, everyday stumbling all around us. And yet most of the time we’re fairly oblivious to them:

• Parents whose children are terminally ill.

• Couples in the middle of a divorce.

• People grieving loss of loved ones and relationships.

• Kids being bullied at school.

• Young people who want to end their lives.

• People marking the anniversary of a death.

• Parents worried about their depressed teen.

• Spouses whose partners are deployed.

• Families with no idea how to keep the lights on.

• Single parents with little help and little sleep.

People are grieving and worried and fearful, and yet none of us wear the signs, none of us have labels, and none of us come with written warnings reading, “I’m struggling. Go easy.”

And since they don’t, it’s up to you and me to look more closely and more deeply at everyone around us, and to never assume they aren’t all just hanging by a thread. Because most people are hanging by a thread - and our simple kindness can be that thread.

We need to remind ourselves just how hard the hidden stories around us might be and to approach each person as a delicate, breakable, invaluable treasure - and to handle them with care.

As you make your way through the worried world tomorrow, people won’t be wearing signs to announce their mourning or to alert you to the attrition or to broadcast how terrified they are - but if you look, with the right eyes, you’ll see the signs.

There are grieving people all around you. Go easy. “

……………..John Pavlovitz

“Pure relief. The world will give you that once in awhile, a brief time out; where somebody dabs mercy on your beat up life.”

…..The Secret Life of Bees 🐝