kindness - helpfulness - helpfulness 2

Kindness is more important than
wisdom, and the recognition of
this is the beginning of wisdom.

Theodore Isaac Rubin

   

Kindness is one of the gentle expressions of love.  We grow in grace when we become aware that one of God's gifts to us can be that we may share our loving kindness with all of creation.  People all over the world are seeking peace of mind, solutions to everyday problems, better relationships with other people, and a more meaningful way of life.  Surely we are aware of the room for improvement within ourselves and in our life.  A healthy serving of loving kindness--both giving and receiving--could make a difference!

John Marks Templeton
Worldwide Laws of Life

      
What if we--just you and I--made a commitment to mindfully integrate kindness into each and every day of our lives?  We would start a kindness revolution.  Let's do it.  Let's become the proverbial pebbles in the pond and send out ripples of kindness into the world each day.  Those whose hearts are touched by our kindness will, hopefully, be encouraged to pass it on, and a revolution of much-needed kindness will have begun.

Sue Patton Thoele
  

We restore the holiness of the world through our loving-kindness and compassion.  Everyone participates.  It is a collective task.  Every act of loving-kindness, no matter how great or small, repairs the world.  All those ever born have shared this collective work since the beginning of time.

Rachel Naomi Remen

   

Kindheartedness is what we treasure most in family, friends, classmates, colleagues, adversaries, and strangers.  A kind heart, a loving heart, a soft heart would rather do anything than hurt another's feelings. . . . A person who is kind is gentle, considerate, and inclined to benevolent actions.  A kindhearted person is also nice.

Michael Goddart

   

I often wonder why people do not make more of the marvelous
power there is in kindness.  It is the greatest lever to move
the hearts of people that the world has ever known.

Andrew Chapman

   

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Life is mostly froth and bubble,
Two things stand like stone,
Kindness in another's trouble,
Courage in your own.

Adam Lindsay Gordon

   

A single act of kindness may have a long trajectory and
touch those we will never meet or see.  Something that
we casually offer may move through a web of connection
far beyond ourselves to have effects that we may have
never imagined.  And so each of us may have left far
more behind us than we may ever know.


Rachel Naomi Remen

    

Kindness is an inner desire that makes us want to do good things
even if we do not get anything in return.  It is the joy of our life to
do them.  When we do good things from this inner desire, there is
kindness in everything we think, say, want and do.

Emmanuel Swedenborg

A life of kindness is the primary meaning of divine worship.

   

The world can be harsh and negative, but if we remain generous and patient,
kindness inevitably reveals itself.  Something deep in the human soul seems
to depend on the presence of kindness; something instinctive in us expects it,
and once we sense it we are able to trust and open ourselves.

John O'Donohue

   

Kindness is the beginning and the end of the law.

Hebrew proverb

    

Kindness is the root of righteousness.  Kindness is the enemy
of cruelty, harshness, rudeness.  It softens the heart.
It opens the door to heaven.

Sivananda

    

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All the kindness which a person puts out into the world
works on the heart and thoughts of humankind.

Albert Schweitzer

   

Without kindness there can be no true joy.

Thomas Carlyle

   

One kind word wins more willing service than
a hundred harsh orders or stern reproofs.

Jean P. Camus

    

Kindness works simply and perseveringly.  Hence it is the furthest
reaching and the most effective of all forces.

Albert Schweitzer

    

They whose minds are filled with kindness
will never enter a world dark with woe.

Tiruvalluvar

  

When I interact with individuals around me in thoughtful, caring ways, my actions
become an influence for good.  I know that kindness shared multiplies and
has a ripple effect as it radiates from one heart to another.

unattributed

    

Kindness is not without its rocks ahead.  People are apt to put it down
to an easy temper and seldom recognize it as the secret striving
of a generous nature; whilst, on the other hand, the ill-natured
get credit for all the evil they refrain from.

Honore De Balzac

  

For most of us mere mortals, trying to love absolutely everyone can feel
daunting.  So most days I focus on just trying to be kind.  Kindness is
human sized and so doable.  Kindness is the country cousin to love.  It
does small things at unexpected moments, opening up doors in windowless
rooms.  If I start with simply being kind--love is usually following along,
nodding its head saying, "yes, that's the way it done."

Carrie Newcomer

   

    
    

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Kindness has taken a bad rap in many ways, being associated with
weakness or meekness or labels like "goody-goody."  But true
kindness comes from strength, and is full of life.

Bo Lozoff

helpfulness - helpfulness 2

    

Utter only the words of which we won't be ashamed afterwards,
which we won't regret saying.  It is easy to discourage, it is far too
easy, all too easy to criticize, to complain, to rebuke.  Let us try
instead to be more quick to see even a small amount of good in a
person and concentrate on that.  Let us be more quick to praise
than to find fault.  Let us be more quick to thank others than to
complain--"thank you" and "please" are small words,
but they are oh, so powerful.

Desmond Tutu
Believe

   

Many years ago, early in our relationship, my wife, Devers, said something
that impressed me profoundly.  "You are very kind, generous, and caring--
when you stop long enough in what you are doing for it to occur to you.
What you have never learned is the discipline of kindness.  This means
kindness that is not a matter of mood or convenience.  It means kindness
as a basic way of functioning.  It is in you as a potential, but it doesn't happen
without consciousness and discipline."  "The discipline of kindness"--I have
learned to love that phrase.  When I mention it in lectures, everyone seems
instantly to know what it means--just as, I suspect, you do now.

Nathaniel Branden
Self-Esteem Every Day

  
Showing kindness to others is one of the nicest things we can do for ourselves.

Janette Oke
   

Kindness is a spiritual choice.

Bernie Siegel

  

When seeds of kindness are sown prayerfully in the garden plot of
our lives, we may be sure that there will be a bountiful
harvest of blessings for both us and others.

W. Phillip Keller

   

   
I let others see my natural kindness.  Kindness creates places of
joy and freedom in our lives.  By being kind, I rise above the fight
for survival or for material success.  I live consciously to create a
world that is a kind and good place to live in.
    Kindness has nothing to do with the fear of not being loved; it
stems from a generous heart.  I do not show others that I am kind
to impress them.  I know that I was born kind.

unattributed
   

Kindness is the redemption of humanity.  The world is in
the mess we observe because we feel separate and alone.
Kindness bridges that gap and dissolves alienation.

Alan Cohen
The Tao Made Easy

   

Often when we perform a kindness for someone, we do it surreptitiously,
as if it is something to be ashamed of.  That’s crazy!  Humans and animals
learn by watching the actions of others. When you see an act of kindness,
you are more likely to repeat that behavior.  Prime time news programs
designate a disproportionately high coverage to crimes and violence
compared to upbeat stories about loving, helpful kindnesses people
have done for others. I wish they turned their programming around,
dedicating the majority of time to good news.

Bernie Siegel
No Endings, Only Beginnings

   
  

There is nothing so kingly as kindness,
And nothing so royal as truth.

Alice Cary

  

My dad did his best to discourage unkind words.  The only phone in our
house--and we had 11 children--sat right smack on his desk in the dining
room.  Every time he'd overhear me putting down someone more popular
than I was (which could mean anyone at high school), he'd scold, "That's
not very nice," loud enough for the person on the other end of the line to
hear.  Or worse, he'd say, "Would you say that about her
if she was standing here?"

Regina Brett
Be the Miracle

   

Kindness means doing a lot of little things kindly
and always, not just a big thing now and then.

Neville Hobson

   

The older you get the more you realize that kindness
is synonymous with happiness.

Lionel Barrymore

  

If we knew the power of kindness, we should transform
this world into a paradise.

Charles Wagner

  

Kindness is wisdom.

Phillip J. Bailey

  

  

There were once many kind people, and even unkind ones pretended
to be good because that was the thing to do.  Such pretense was the
source of the hypocrisy and dishonesty so much exposed in the realist
literature at the end of the last century.  The unexpected result of this
kind of critical writing was that kind people disappeared.  Kindness is
not, after all, an inborn quality--it has to be cultivated, and this only
happens when it is in demand.  For our generation, kindness was an
old-fashioned, vanished quality, and its exponents were as extinct as
the mammoth.  Everything we have seen in our times--the class warfare,
the constant "unmasking" of people, the search for an ulterior motive
behind every action--all this has taught us to be anything you like except kind.

Nadezhda Mandelstam
Hope against Hope:  A Memoir

  

The development of loving kindness is a demanding practice that requires
time.  However, see if you can cultivate some part of loving kindness toward
yourself, other people in your life, and the natural world around you every day.
As we keep practicing, we begin to see beyond what is best for ourselves, or
for other people, toward what is good for all life that is affected by our actions.
Loving kindness for all life on the earth is the ultimate result of
the deepest understanding of the unity of life.

Claire Thompson
Mindfulness and the Natural World

  

Kindness does not stop with us; we can extend it outward from ourselves,
like the ripples on a pond, toward our family, friends, and loved ones.  This
is relatively natural and effortless.  But for loving kindness to be genuine,
it cannot just end with the people we know and like; it has to go further,
toward those we do not know and even do not like.  This includes people
we may be having a hard time with, someone with whom communication is
difficult, where negative issues have arisen that are pulling the
relationship apart, where there is anger, resentment, or dislike.

Ed and Deb Shapiro

   
At Set of Sun
George Eliot
(also found titled "Count That Day Lost")

If you sit down at set of sun
And count the acts that you have done,
   And, counting, find
One self-denying deed, one word
That eased the heart of him who heard,
   One glance most kind
That fell like sunshine where it went --
Then you may count that day well spent.

But if, through all the livelong day,
You've cheered no heart, by yea or nay --
   If, through it all
You've nothing done that you can trace
That brought the sunshine to one face--
   No act most small
That helped some soul and nothing cost --
Then count that day as worse than lost.
   

        
   

Found online:
 

 
(Found online images come from a variety of unattributed
sources from various social media pages.  They're too nice
not to share!)

    
    

Alone in his car heading west, it's easy for Jason
to feel sorry for himself and mad at the world.  But
then he gives a ride to Hector and learns that life
isn't nearly as negative as we sometimes see it,
and that the prejudice and discrimination that
he's experiencing aren't unique to him--and aren't
impossible to overcome.  The friendship between
this young man and his 70-year-old passenger is
an inspiring story of love and dealing with
obstacles in our lives.    
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