“This is my simple religion. No need for temples. No need for complicated philosophy. Your own mind, your own heart is the temple. Your philosophy is simple kindness. My religion is very simple. My religion is kindness.”
– Dalai Lama –
If there is one thing that I learned from life is that, in any given situation, be kind and choose kindness.
Always.
No matter how unfortunate the situation is, we always have the option to choose kindness. And this means, not just to others, but also to ourselves.
More and more we understand that all the things in this world always change; situations change, problems arise from time to time, and people come and go. Life is just full of ups and down. But the thing is, we do have an option each time; how do we respond to it, how do we want to take action at any given chance. I do believe choosing kindness could never go wrong.
It is easy to be kind when we are happy and our mood is really good. But really the real question is,
Can we be more kind when someone upset us? Can we make a gentle pause before bursting out our anger to someone else?
Can we treat a stranger with the same kindness with our family or friends?
Kindness is also mean how we want to act in this world in the best possible way. Even the smallest random act of kindness could make an impact on someone’s life. Offer a big smile and a sincere thanks to others; the parking guy, the security person in the office, the lady sitting next to us in the bus, the waitress in our favorite restaurant, anyone.
Give some change to the street musician and enjoy the music they perform without the need to rush, be there for a friend in need like having ice cream in her/his bad day, call up our parents without a specific reason, share the food with a gojek driver after ordering a meal, give a bigger cash tip for the delivery guy, throw some trashes you see on the street. The option is limitless.
Kindness also means how we treat ourselves with compassion. Offer kindness to ourselves, especially in a not favorable situation. Forgive yourself when making mistakes and even let yourself have a bad mood for some time (without annoying others), treat yourself to watching a movie in the premiere cinema with your favorite meal, buy fresh flowers for yourself when achieving something (or even without special occasion), letting go some expectations, prioritizing your mental health above all and really just become the best friend for yourself. This is something that I used to struggle with the most.
There is more kindness definition. It is also about being considerate of other human beings regardless of their skin tone, political choice, religion, economic status, and others. It is also about being kind to our mother earth, making small steps to preserve the environment like minimizing the use of plastic bags or fixing things instead of buying new each time. It is also about kindness to animals, feeding a stray cat on the street or even adopting one of them. There is a broad range of spectrum of kindness in every aspect of life.
I remember I had some real issues at work with a colleague which used to be my good friend a couple of years ago, it got so bad that I felt I was drowned in this big wave of negative emotion for months. I was so angry with the person, I blamed myself for this conflict, and the friendship was broken. Fast forward to a few months ago, for some work reason, we had another round of conflict.
I rest my case.
I have nothing but kindness at that time. I tried my best not to get too emotional while maintaining my professionalism, and one thing that I did was really just to respond in a kind possible way. I offer myself the same kindness and compassion, something that I always forgot. I accept the fact that the relationship could never be repaired, that I did my best to improve the situation, and also accept that we are just two different people. But this time around I have no anger to the person or to my self.
I made peace with myself.
It is indeed not easy sometimes, but it is always worth trying.
So there you go, a little piece of wisdom. I hope it was a good reading for you, and perhaps give some thoughts
Last but not least, I hope that I could be a better person from time to time, offering more and more kindness and compassion to the world, and indeed, to myself. ☕
With love,
Inuk
TRI NURAINI 
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