Fighting Windmills

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My friend Bikkuri inspired me to write about kindness when I read his kindness meme last month. This meme consists of three lists.

First are five things I do to be kind to myself:

• I listen to music I like and I maintain my own taste in music.
• I visit the blogs of my friends so that I can learn new things and be challenged.
• I eat 3 meals a day.
• I tell myself my life story in a positive way. The voice in my head speaks to me full of hope and promise; I play positive messages in my mental tape player.
• I don’t smoke anymore (almost 6 weeks now).

Second are five things I have done to show kindness to a stranger:

• When I see moms I smile at them and compliment them (if I can work up the nerve). I think that’s important because sometimes moms feel like targets in public if their children don’t measure up to people’s ideals.
• I’m courteous on the telephone with customer service representatives.
• I wave to the road crew when I drive through a construction zone.
• Once I was at the office where we pay our rent and there was a man who couldn’t make himself understood in English. I offered to interpret and I helped him get his rent payment sorted out.
• I always hold the door for the people coming behind me.

And third are five kind things I do for my daughter:

• I compliment her beauty.
• I help her make good choices and then I support her choices.
• I role play with her and give her ideas for how to interact with people in scary situations. For example, I taught her how to tell someone she is shy around dogs. She wants to ask permission to touch a dog at the park, but she wants the dog’s owner to know that she’s not used to being around dogs, so we practice that dialog.
• When she asks me a question I ask her opinion and ask her what she thinks the answer could be.
• I praise her creativity and hang her artwork on our walls.

This meme is a great exercise for being more aware of how you behave and how kindness will influence what quality of life you have. Please try it and let me know if you post the lists on your own blog.

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