As we head towards Ash Wednesday and the Season of Lent when we prepare ourselves for the Easter season, let us spread kindness everywhere as part of our 2023 Lenten Journey.

Kindness helps people feel respected, valued and worthy. It helps them feel connected to others; that they belong.

In his book The Kindness Revolution, Hugh Mackay notes that: listening is one of the most precious gifts we can give each other. It is one of the most potent symbols of love and friendship. It’s one of the loveliest expressions of kindness. It’s one of the greatest sources of encouragement to the discouraged, confidence to the insecure and comfort to the emotionally wounded (2021. 83).

Listening is also an act of kindness that we can all practise in the everyday of our lives. It requires care and openness to others and the ability to put aside our own needs and preconceptions. It requires attentiveness, patience and the ability to step into the shoes of another without judgement. And it requires courage to open ourselves to the burdens and sorrow of others.

Listening is a gift we can give others – friends, family, colleagues and strangers – anywhere and anytime. Attentive listening is a way of saying ‘you matter’. It is a humble, responsive and loving response to those who walk life’s journey with us.

When describing acts of kindness like listening, Mackay observes that everyday acts of kindness, compassion, goodwill, and cooperation go unremarked precisely because they are unremarkable for members of a species like ours. The people who stop to help total strangers out of a jam … the people who, night after night, week after week, year after year, volunteer their services to help feed the poor and homeless … the people who have cheerfully sacrificed their own ambition to support a spouse, or a child who needed them … the people who volunteer big chunks of their week to patrol surf beaches, or train as bush fire-fighters, or coach sports teams … (2021. 44). 

This list could go on and on, but Mackay is making the point that kindness is never about doing something for another to reap a benefit – it is the essential quality of a cooperative species … a frame of mind; a way of being in the world (47).

It is something we can all practise in our own homes, communities and workplaces. Kindness helps people feel respected, valued and worthy. It helps them feel connected to others; reinforcing that they belong. The more people who experience kindness from you, the happier people you’ll have in your life.

In the words of St Teresa of Calcutta: 

Spread kindness wherever you go and let nobody come to you without leaving happier.

Take care and keep safe