Recoil

If you ever want to see
how being kind to
someone can change
them, please read this.

I've written before about the kindness of strangers.  It is something I believe in and I try to practice myself.  I believe that, despite my occasional evil moments, it is better to live a kind life whenever possible.  Sure, I rant to myself on the freeway here, but I still let people in when they want to merge and love it when I get a wave in the rearview (merging does seem to be an issue in Seattle).  I am not just kind to people because I'm hoping it will come back around to me.  And I'm certainly not kind because I want to be some selfless heroine.  I believe those small acts of kindness on a daily basis add up to a better life for me.  And it's amazing that I might be making someone else's life better, or at least a little easier, as well.

Don't be grumbly, you guys.

But more than that, the small petty acts that occur on a daily basis are poison to the soul.  Not only do you run the risk of making other people feel bad about themselves, you are doubtlessly thinking less of you every time you do it.  Rave all you want about how you're such a badass and you don't care, but it is having an impact on you.  You may not see it now, hell you may not see it ever, but trust me - it is definitely there.  

I suppose there is a fine balance.  You can't give your all and receive nothing in return and you can't constantly be editing yourself for the sake of others.  You do have to keep your sanity, after all.  We all need moments to vent.  We all have bad days.  But I think that being unkind never really works out in our favor.  Being thoughtless doesn't help, either.  We live in a social media-heavy world.  Unfortunately, a lot of people on Twitter, Facebook, and the like seem to believe that there are no consequences to what they put out there.  

I had a friend tell me yesterday that it's his life, his Facebook page and it's no one else's business.  He's not entirely wrong.  But it is his choice to post something that he knows will hurt someone else.  And there are repercussions to hurting your friends, even if it seems silly for one to say that he or she was hurt by something on someone else's Facebook page (oh, the horror).  I don't mean this in a that's-a-punishable-offense kind of way.  The simple fact is that someone did get hurt and you did that.  You chose to put your need to show off/be right/prove something before someone else's need to just exist in a happy kind of peace.  You knew it would hurt, but you decided your petty needs were greater.  No one is ever happy at the end of that.

This is an Instant Debbie Downer
app for your phone...oh my god.

Mary told me about a friend of hers who "starts every other sentence with 'I hate' and fills her Facebook page with snark and generally unkind comments."  Unsurprisingly, it's to her own detriment more than anyone else's.  I can think of one good reason why - everyone else probably just doesn't read it.  And you can always block someone's posts without "unfriending" them.  That kind of negativity eats away at the user.  This is nothing new.

What you put out there does matter.  Maybe it doesn't matter to the general population.  Shoot, maybe it only matters to your mom.  But it's bound to matter to someone other than you.  So post your political opinions, your rants and raves about traffic or a bad experience at the grocery store, or show off your new love interest even though you know the old one is on your friends list and still hurting.  But don't for one moment think that it's not going to effect anyone but you.  Furthermore, understand that most of the time, it is going to come back to you.  And you may not like the results.