Imagine what the world would be like if we all prioritized love and kindness.  How amazing would it be to rid the world of anger and hate?  No more bullying or isolation leading to a world with less anxious people living in a state of peace.

Kindness has been on my mind this week, even before the Oscars.  Don’t get me wrong, my heart was full to see the clips of Lady Gaga and Liza Minnelli at the Oscars.  Kindness and grace were shining brightly.

I know there is goodness in the world, but Jesus has been showing me the need for increased attention to love.  Reoccurring in my mind was the need for a kindness challenge, similar to the once-popular ice bucket challenge. 

I know that Kids for Peace has a “great kindness challenge” providing tools to create an atmosphere of compassion, acceptance, unity, and respect in one’s community, schools, etc.  The challenge that comes to my mind is much simpler.  A commitment to refocus judgmental thoughts back to kindness, understanding, and love.

We are currently exposed to genuine kindness from people of various countries uniting together to aid those displaced in the current war.  But we are also exposed daily to challenges that don’t positively affect people’s self-esteem.

Is it our place to judge who receives kindness and who doesn’t?

Upon occasion, I feel judgment entering my mind.  It is my goal to be kind and to make people feel better about themselves.  When I begin to feel judgmental I remind myself that it is my job to love not to judge.  My perspective quickly moves to kindness. 

When someone is being cruel or unkind it is a challenge to remind yourself to let kindness shine.   I immediately feel when I’m off course and need redirection. I concentrate on love and kindness and am immediately directed back to focusing on treating people with respect.  Refocusing is not always easy, but it is worth the effort!

I have written blogs on kindness before, it’s a very important topic to me.  In this blog, however, I’m calling people to take action.  To take action even when you think that you have love and kindness in your heart.  Take action and recognize exactly how kind you are treating those who enter your circle of influence.  Despite thinking I was a fairly kind person when I challenged myself to direct all my thoughts back to love and kindness, I realized I had been more judgmental than I had first thought.

I challenge you to look at everything you say, do, and are involved with and ask yourself if it represents kindness. Are your words and your actions displaying love towards others?

Start with a mindset of kindness and love.  A smile, saying hello, some encouragement, a positive comment, spending time with someone, including someone in the group, and random acts of kindness are all simple ways to spread love.  It is nice to think in terms of what we can do to make other people’s lives better.

I have always been intentional about being kind and helpful to others.  Many people are kind and helpful.  The change for me was when I chose to view everything from the perspective of love.  When I started to look at every situation with love, kindness prevailed.  I am not proud of my momentary judgmental setbacks, but I am aware that love is a key ingredient in being kind.

Are you up for the kindness challenge? 

What a joy it would be to have a world that actively displays and promotes love and kindness. 

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