A lesson on Kindness

I came across two things within the past week that have caused me to really reflect on life and my purpose here in this crazy world.  The first being the book The Four Desires by Rob Stryker (thank you Kelley Bishop for your tweet) and the second, Rachel Joy Scott, a young girl who, although is no longer with us, has a message of kindness that continues to reach millions.  If you have a few minutes and a box of tissues, check out her challenge to the rest of the world.  It truly is remarkable.  And I am very grateful that I came across these two things because they really helped me yesterday in a day that was filled with just a little drama...

Yesterday I woke up to some craziness (via FB of course) that I was not prepared for - a string of messages that progressively got harsher as the hours went by.  Well thankfully, I had running club with my girls so I was going to put that aside and focus on something more positive.  Once running club was over I stayed and chatted with some of the cross country members and the coach just to avoid what was waiting for me when I checked my email.  And then I decided, you know what? I'm just going to keep running (I sort of felt like Forrest Gump).  It was drama free, it was stress free, and I felt good doing it. But I wasn't running to the ocean, so I had to turn around and go back home.

One can never put off the inevitable so around 10:00am, I opened my email.  I won't go into details about anything other than to say, things got mean.  I opted out of responding but still had my feelings hurt.  Earlier in the week, after reading some of The Four Desires, I decided my dharma had something to do with kindness (still working on my code) and therefore, I was going to take that route.  And after learning about Rachel Scott, I continuously asked myself, "How would Rachel handle this?  In the midst of all this negativity, how would she handle this with kindness?"  I did what I thought was right and made a few phone calls.  I have no idea if it was the best thing to do or not, but I'm glad I did it.

Afterwards, I went to volunteer with Girls on the Run. I was little hesitant to go because I wanted to stay around the house and continue to think about all of this but I decided to go anyway.  If I could only tell you the overwhelming positive feeling being with all of those awesome women working on something so amazing brought me.... I forgot about everything because I was surrounded by good people doing good things.  It reminded me of one of the lines from the book (and I'm not quoting exactly here...): It's not the circumstances of your life that shape your destiny, it's how you choose to respond to them.  Even amongst all the craziness yesterday, there was something good and that was what I was going to focus on. And it reinforced that message of kindness that Rachel Scott was so dedicated to.  So I decided no matter what, to keep kindness and positive feelings in my heart and that would be how I chose to handle this.

If you think about it, when people are mean to one another and say harsh things, it's so easy to react irrationally and with emotion.  I had a hard time deciding yesterday if I was being passive and letting things just happen or if I was truly doing the right thing.  Do I respond or do I step away?  Being with Girls on the Run yesterday helped me to realize my energies are better focused there and not on something that I can not control, hence stepping away with a smile on my face is the right thing to do.  Running is my passion. Helping young children is my passion.  I have so many smart, kind and loving people in my life and that helps me to stay focused on the important things.  I feel lucky to be surrounded by such great people because you all went through my mind yesterday.  You all helped me to remember the importance of kindness, and for that I am thankful.