Be kind

Since getting more a handle of my mental health and inspired by Mr. Rogers, patron saint of all things kind, I have made an effort to spread pleasantness, particularly when it is not expected. When workers give me back a three dollar deposit I had not paid, I return it, saying I wouldn't want their counts to be off. So small a thing and they react as though I had been noble by not cheating them in this minor way, one that likely wouldn't have been noticed. I am patient to a clerk, acknowledging the shop is busy, and she exceeds her already sweetness in thanking me for being one of the "good customers," as though one shouldn't be understanding of the circumstances that barely affect my shopping experience. I listen to people with interest and attention, and they bloom before me because they are used to people only getting enough information to respond. We are secluded in public, we are lonely in crowds. The last time I felt the world could unite in kindness was in the aftermath of 9/11.

Even the simple act of remembering someone's name, a skill at which I do not naturally excel, matters. I practice at the grocery store because they have name tags and it relieves the pressure of accidents. They work to keep food on shelves, or bathrooms clean, or make me food. I am not better than them for being on the other side of the register and they are not less human for helping me. You are not kind when you assume undue power over another person, when you deny others their humanity because they are earning a living assisting you.

I don't think I was necessarily mean prior, but I did not give myself liberty to niceness. I wanted interactions to be brief so I could be left alone to my inner world of mood imbalance and worry. I didn't have the energy to be expansive in general, to give a little more than necessary. I was too anxious, too insomniac, too insecure to do anyone justice. If I couldn't say anything nice, I chose not to say anything at all, so much that some people expressed shock that I spoke at all.

As a teacher in juvenile justice, I live and work with abject cruelty, perpetuated by and on my students, and I survive by doing what I can to make the lives of others-even those whom I will know only a minute-brighter. My mind can be vicious to me, but this makes me feel better without much draining my emotional reserves. This lets me fractionally tip the scales back to goodness.

We give other people power over us, our days ruined by rude customers and negligent parents. The world seems a crueler place than the one I knew growing up, or I am more aware. Racism, sexism, xenophobia, casual malice existed before the widespread adoption of the internet, but it is nearly impossible to evade it now. The news is lousy with conspiracies for comingled atrocities. We can combat this in our microcosm, flip the societal script, merely by acknowledging the humanity of others. Kindness is punk. Niceness is neurolinguistic hacking. We can make people feel their world is good, even in an unfeeling universe, and it does not hurt us to do it. Why wouldn't we? Why be snide and catty to strangers? Why not try to see what they are going through and try to make it better by caring? We would relish it done on our behalf. I want to live in a benevolent world and none of us truly do. There is no harm in pretending if one is doing so as an act of will, of magic to affect this change. We can make this world less awful, and our lives will improve in consort. Amateur sages and newbie therapists trot out the old saw about how doing good for others distracts one from one's pain. That it puts one in contact with those that need them, and has them rub shoulders with other helpers, surely helps one's attitude.

I have gone through adolescent phases of ironic detachment, because not caring about anything seemed cool. Everyone who was anyone was disaffected. It was exhausting, self-conscious, isolating, boring, false, and frankly not fun. In retrospect, no one believed a word of it, but they were all looking out of their peripheral who would be the first to break character. Aside from giggling like crows over some cutting remarks said under my breath, it did not bring joy into my life.

Life is too short and cold not to try to stave off Heat Death inspiring others to happiness. Even writing that makes me want to instinctively apologize for its cheesiness, because our society doesn't seem to want us to be nice to one another. Those in power prefer we are at one another's throats so we don't remember our persecutors have exposed jugulars.

As tends to be my refrain when my actions may otherwise be construed as being pro-social, my being pleasant is a combination of enlightened self-interest and my nature, albeit perhaps a nature ameliorated by psychopharmacopeia. I want to live in the safety of a kind world. Making eye contact and genuinely thanking waitstaff is so small a sacrifice. Does it assure nothing bad will happen to me, that my ostensible kindness will not be met with animosity? Of course not and I accept this, though I can hope my niceness will defuse someone else's bad day, giving them compassion for what they are going through. I do it for my ego and to improve the space I occupy and, by dint of this, the people who might make it better for me. I am like those Christians who bless you only to connive their passage through the Pearly Gates. Bereft of certainty of eternal reward, their generosity, their magnanimity, would evaporate. I am as close to Heaven as I am ever apt to get, so I choose to help others believe it isn't Hell, all evidence to the contrary. I want people to connect with me, to make me feel seen. I want a world ripe with anonymous acts of kindness because it is a better hallucination than the stark awareness of my circumstances.

My kindness is less directed at specific persons as people as a whole. I return mislaid things where they seem to belong. I prevent lost items from being trod upon and broken. When biking, I have found windblown mail and returned it to the ascribed boxes securely. I clean up garbage I find in my town, clear brush away. I don't want people to know I am doing these things, though some see me snatching up a tipped coffee cup some Bard kid left on a bench and placing it in the nearest garbage. Each little act, done silently (but for this chronicling), makes me feel better. I wouldn't want anyone to call me on it, since that would make me feel awkward. I am doing these things for myself, not an audience.

I listened to a story about a teacher who had taken to clicker training his medical residents on how to use tools. When he openly praised or corrected them, they became fixated with that verbal acknowledgment. Now, he clicks when they have done it right and otherwise repeats his direction. If they keep failing the task, he will run them through it again, but not with any impatience. This works wonderfully. When I do right, I feel a click in the universe. It is not praise, but it is something that fires off within me to let me know that I have done what I am supposed to do.

Soon in Xenology: Something, surely.

last watched: The Curious Creations of Christine McConnell
reading: Strange Frequencies
listening: Yeah Yeah Yeahs