The Holes in Kindness

I miss Kindergarten. 

Do you remember how easy things were when you first started school? The pressures of “adulting” didn’t exist yet. You were expected to eat paint.  You coloured outside the lines because it was more fun. Three notes on a piano brainwashed you to tidy up. You caught the stomach flu at least seven times during the school year. And you peed your pants at least once.  Don’t lie and say you didn’t.  WE ALL DID IT. The pressure was off in the Kindie class… sometimes the pants were off, too.

It was a pivotal time in a child’s life, a place where we learned to share, sing and laugh. I still remember a key lesson first learned in kindergarten - how to be kind to others. One act of kindness inspired more kind gestures. When everyone in class was kind, it made the day more fun. Kindness led to more camaraderie and cooperation in class, a boost of self-confidence, and usually more playtime. It was a mental high providing more pleasure than the stick of glue we sniffed during arts and crafts.  Don’t get all “high” and mighty on me.  WE ALL DID IT. 

“The Golden Rule” was one of the first themes I wrote about in my journal when I had my “WOW moment.” I planned to explore more themes about kindness later on in my writing journey.

In recent weeks and months, I pondered about this “rule” and how I can become a better writer and overall human being through the act of kindness. My daughter’s gift a few weeks ago reminded me how much I forgot how to be kind to myself regularly. Part of self-care is self-kindness.  I used to think it was more important to be kind to others before myself. Is it possible to be more kind to others when I am more kind to myself?

Self-kindness is not only external. The “inner voice” talking down at you - telling yourself you're stupid or you're never going to succeed - is not a form of kindness. At times we prioritize the Golden Rule over our self-worth. If you don't want someone to treat you like an a-hole, why are you going to be an a-hole to yourself? How does this make sense? You can’t see your own a-hole.  Are you going to let it talk smack to you to treat you badly behind your back??? 

Would you like someone to pull your hair? No? Don’t pull somebody else’s hair. And don’t pull your own hair. Stop being your own a-hole. 

Constant unkindness to ourselves brings waves of doubt, increased anxiety, and a loss of sense of self. It also becomes harder to find reasons to be kind at all.

I use writing and journaling to capture kind and unkind moments.  Seeing these patterns is an important step to curate the life I want for myself. Writing also helped me break down the Golden Rule as only one part of the kindness puzzle.  When we are kind to ourselves, it becomes second nature to be kind to others. When we are kind to others we are encouraged to be kind to ourselves. The kindness puzzle now becomes a bright sphere that wants to grow.

I believe we are all born with kind hearts. Whether the seeds of kindness bloom earlier or later in life, the roots of displaying and witnessing kindness are commonly established in the first years of school. Adult life took us away from the basics and owning up to our pee-pee pants. We all should return to our mental “Kindergarten” once in a while, as a reminder to not complicate kindness. 

We are all constantly learning to be good humans, and we should always continue learning. Adding to the Golden Rule with acts of self-kindness may be the foundation of lifelong happiness. The sooner we un-learn and re-learn the basics of kindness, the easier it is to naturally be kind. 

And If we all manage our own “holes,” we can all experience joy together.

Thank you for kindly supporting and joining me on 660 days of my writing journey, fellow creatives.

Naddy / Nadine