A Time to be Kind
Image from CDD20 at Pixabay
I first came across the idea of random acts of kindness from a book only we old hippies are likely to have heard of, in my twenties, and which remains to this day my Desert Island book of choice.
A Course In Miracles is dauntingly chunky and offers a daily spiritual practice with an exercise for each day of the year. I came close but I don’t think I ever actually completed it in its entirety. However, it did introduce me to some ideas that are, I think, as good today as they were then.
One was ‘commit random acts of kindness and senseless acts of beauty’, which delighted me then and continues to do so to this day.
Over the intervening years a whole industry has sprung up around random acts of kindness and though it feels a bit counterproductive to save those acts for just one day of the year, Random Acts of Kindness Day is celebrated all over the world in February and this year it’s the 17th.
Most years we write something about it in Pembrokeshire.Online because the world can be a grim place for many, and a reminder to be kind for at least one day of the year is better than nothing.
Many schools now use the idea to help teach kids about empathy and I have written in articles about the simple pleasure of doing something (preferably anonymously for me) that might lift another living being’s spirits.
There are websites with ideas on how to commit your random acts, from shopping for a neighbour to leaving a secret gift for a workmate. It doesn’t have to cost money and – who knows? – one little act on the 17February could become a daily, weekly or monthly habit that delights you too.
