6: Acts of Kindness
Hopefully by now you’re well on your way to a more joyful life. So what’s the next “upwards” from there? Spreading your joy to others.
Consciously going out of your way to be kind and helpful has as many benefits for you as the recipients of your kindness.
We all have daily struggles and worries. Sometimes our problems can feel bigger than ourselves. Taking time out to help someone else takes our focus off our own worries for a moment and helps us look at the bigger picture of the world.
It helps you clarify your purpose and feel like you are living in line with your values as the best version of yourself. It gives you a feeling of integrity, purpose and worth.
How to do it:
Go out of your way to open the door for someone or assist them with a task.
Text or email an encouraging message to someone in your network you know could use a little boost right now.
Paint a rock with an inspirational message and leave it for a stranger to find.
Pay for the person behind you at a fast food restaurant.
Leave an encouraging note on a co-workers desk.
If you’re a super friendly, helpful person, you may be already doing these kinds of things without even thinking about. That’s amazing! However, many of the clients I work with tend to be somewhat shy, wary of strangers, or worried that the kind gesture will be instrusive or poorly recieved. Reaching out to someone to help or be kind has a certain note of intimacy and vulnerability that can be a bit out of our comfort zones. However, I think you will find that if you reach out to someone in a genuinely kind way, they will be touched, and you both will feel better about life and humanity because of it.
Why this works to create joy:
We create inner peace when we live our lives in line with our values. When we are literally being the change we wish to see in the world, we develop a sense of agency in our lives, and develop and spread hope.
You will find that not only will having a “Random Act of Kindness” daily practice make others around you happier, it truly will make YOU happier. It will also strengthen your connections with the people already in your life as well as foster new ones. You may find yourself invited out more, or people sharing literal or figurative gifts with you. Life simply gets more beautiful for everyone when you create and spread some JOY.
Try to start with one act of kindness per day, and then from there start training your mind to look for opportunities to be especially kind or helpful.
If you’re less of a spontaneous person, you can also schedule your kind acts, by volunteering, setting a weekly day you check in on an elderly neighbor, etc. While spontaneity is a great skill to cultivate (that goes along with the concept of going with the flow, looking at life as an adventure, etc), if you’re someone that might not have a ton of internal motivation to go out of your way to do an act of kindness, sometimes scheduling something where you know someone is expecting you can be helpful.
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