Thread by @NotTheEasyWay1

If you can be anything, be kind.

What if your version of kindness does more harm than good?

10 ways that you may be misusing kindness.

//Thread//🧵

1. You use kindness to support the route that is simple, easy, and obvious.

True kindness is doing what a person needs and what is best for them.

Often this involves deep consideration of what that might really be.

2. You only validate others’ emotions rather than also exploring the situation further, even when the emotions are based on inaccurate or unhelpful interpretations.

True kindness can involve a gentle challenge that can lead to authentic connection & possibilities for change.

3. You say or do what someone wants you to in the moment, but this leaves them in the same place & struggling later.

True kindness may require doing the hard thing in the short term for the longer-term benefit of another.

It doesn’t shrug its shoulders & look the other way.

4. You believe a person can't change, grow, and face challenges or you don’t want to put them through the strain.

True kindness means we believe change is possible for everyone.

No one is supported by your low expectations.

5. You see being kind as always being gentle and quiet.

True kindness is flexible.

Sometimes it is energetic, inspiring, and provoking.

Sometimes it’s the opposite.

6. Your kindness consists of passive platitudes, with limited sincerity and action.

True kindness often requires courage, tenacity, and fortitude, walking alongside people and facing the storm together.

7. You go along with what everyone else is saying because speaking up may make others uncomfortable.

True kindness is having the courage to speak up for what you believe is right and being prepared to be unpopular when it would be easier to join the silence.

8. You always sacrifice or suppress your own needs for others' needs.

Kindness to strangers can be given without receiving, but kindness in relationships must be reciprocal or resentment will foster.

9. You step away from the difficult thing that needs to be done because it could draw criticism.

True kindness is to bravely do the right thing when others shy away.

Deep kindness is hard and challenging and asks something of us we may struggle to give.

10. Kindness is not performative or prescriptive, it cannot be delivered through scripts or rules.

True kindness is authentic and instinctive and we all know it when we experience it.

#BeKind
#BeTrulyKind
#KindnessMatters
#NotTheEasyWay

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