It all Starts at Home
Kindness is a regarded as a virtue. To act with kindness towards another human is to act with compassion.
It is a virtue for a reason.
Kindness towards others is easily overlooked if we become too self-absorbed. With modern technology and our addiction to social media, it is easy for the human mind to become fixated on our own paradigm and forget that it is our real relationships with other people that enable us to truly thrive.
Basal emotions like anger and fear can easily trip us in to a self-preservation mode which promotes this self-absorbed mindset.
Giving to Give
“You cannot give, what you have not got.”
So, learning to develop self-kindness sits at the root of developing the ability to be kind towards others. When you practice self-kindness, you are teaching yourself both how to be kind as well as how to receive kindness. Not only that, you are nurturing yourself to grow and develop.
To be kind to yourself, you must first learn to respect and value yourself. This will be easier for some people than others. Easy or not, it is essential for you to thrive.
An act of kindness can be an act of encouragement when one is facing difficult or challenges, in this key scenario kindness serves as an energy boost, increasing your will and momentum to conquer what you are facing – even if this is yourself!
The more you are kind, the more experience you build up of overcoming challenges, and the bigger your repository of evidence that you can succeed will becomes. Afterall, when you are facing with a challenging situation, you will first check what evidence you have that you can overcome it before you collect the self-belief that you can overcome it.
Kindness fuels a self-perpetuating loop that makes this happen.
You are building the vitality needed succeed,
and learning to be kind while doing so.
How to accept kindness
If you find it difficult to accept kindness, it shows that you have a lack of self-worth. You simply don’t think you deserve someone being kind to you. Practicing self-kindness means adopting a less harsh perspective of yourself, being more accepting of your challenges and growth areas.
It is not a silver bullet, but the practice of self-kindness will lay some of the foundation for you to better accept kindness for others.
Also consider that accepting kindness from another is actually a form of being kind to them… and yourself…
If you allow them to practice their kindness this enables their skill to grow and their self-worth to increase… by accepting their kindness you accept you deserve their kindness which increases your self-worth and ability to be kind… so the cycle flows… elevating the vitality of the whole.
Accept kindness with grace and allow it to flow from you with joy.
Enjoy, for now.