The Wisdom of Kindness
We have been conditioned to dismiss kindness as weak. We've been conditioned to see kindness as an opening to be taken advantage of by everyone around us. We have been conditioned to view kindness as naive, for those bleeding hearts, those poor souls ...
What results have we seen of "fighting back," "the war on ..." and clocking "those people" as the evil ones ...?
We've witnessed ourselves & our communities get smaller, hoard everything from resources to education to freedom, close doors to ideas/solutions/innovations that don't match our current worldview ... like Gollum holding his "Precious" for dear life ... spiraling into the worst version of himself.
We've been told to dismiss kindness ... without even questioning the people who pump their fists in the air demanding us to do so.
(I am speaking in the realm of general U.S. society & culture, not to specific instances of abuse, trauma, or the like -- except to say kindness toward oneself is paramount.)
The shouting against kindness is quite the strategy, don't you think? I wonder if those chest-thumping for violence know that once they go quiet, you will hear wisdom in the silence ... & their message will be revealed for the smoke & mirrors game that it is.
Wisdom is in the silence. Wisdom is in the pause, the moment of stillness before you / I speak or act in a way that you / I KNOW is not you / me ... but rather a talking head riling us up to carry their message FOR them, rather than speak, act, love, move forward on OUR path.
And when you / I discover the Wisdom that is kindness is accessible to all of us, THAT is powerful. Then the noise from the loudspeaker, the podium, and sometimes the altar to "fight back," "attack," "defeat them" just becomes some scared person yelling at us to help them hoard more power so maybe they won't be so scared anymore.
We're all scared, if we are honest. And there is Wisdom in this honesty, too.
If we got quiet and kind with ourselves, we might admit that we are scared that we might lose our job because we are living paycheck to paycheck ... just like most of the people society yells to exclude. We might admit that we are scared to have a (or another) health crisis ... and "end up" just like the person society dismisses as undeserving of free healthcare. We might admit that we are scared of the community we've become accustomed to changing if "those people" move into our area ... despite the fact that we know nothing about those people except for what a talking head has told us to be afraid of. We might admit that we are scared of losing "our" way of life if we share resources... because we've been told there's not enough (& for some of us, there has not been enough, yet for others we might admit we've had more than we need).
“To embrace the strategy of Jesus is to be engaged in what Dean Brackley calls "downward mobility." Our locating ourselves with those who have been endlessly excluded becomes an act of visible protest. For no amount of our screaming at the people in charge to change things can change them. The margins don't get erased by simply insisting that the powers-that-be erase them. The trickle-down theory doesn't really work here. The powers bent on waging war against the poor and the young and the "other" will only be moved to kinship when they observe it. Only when we can see a community where the outcast is valued and appreciated will we abandon the values that seek to exclude.”
― Greg Boyle, Tattoos on the Heart: The Power of Boundless Compassion
The Kind are the Wisdomkeepers. They, you and (I pray) I can train ourselves in the Wisdom of kindness, the quiet fierceness & calm steadiness & unshakeable stability of kindness above all else. Warrior(esses). The silence is louder and more forceful than any shout, spittle, fist or weapon of the frightened.
Train in the Wisdom of Kindness. Recognize fellow trainees. Recognize the Leaders in Kindness -- may we learn from each other, may we sharpen our skills, may we support (may we vote for) each other.