By Melvin Eapen
Understanding an abstract feeling like kindness requires considerable thought. In exercising it, one has to be objective so as to be equally kind to oneself, others, and the nature. However, people generally conceive of this idea in a narrow dimension. I believe that for a society to evolve in kindness, the first step is to understand the term in its essence.
The old man was pleased when I wished him good day instead of merely clinking few coins to his box. I even overdid the gesture with an enforced smile. Having made him happy, I came home proud of this simple deed. Lying in bed I recollected the event. But the more I thought, more I felt something was wrong. Why did I act so gracious with him? Well, I was being kind. But what made me feel he deserves kindness? I realized with guilt that it was because I thought him as inferior to me. Some predisposition forces people to compare with each other’s standards making few superior to others. They then assume the liability to be nice to the disadvantaged. I realized it is in this line most people try to define their “kindness”. I may even go to the extent saying that my action was a rude gesture, reminding the old man of the position society ascribes him. Much of our kind acts are rooted in this inequality. People tend to believe that being kind is like some random act of charity. Donating for charity stresses the disparity between someone at mercy and someone of affluence. Similarly, it is considered that one at the receiving end of kindness lacks in something which caused him subject to society’s pity. It is this pity that attract the feeling of kindness towards him which too is ill-conceived as a mere charity.
For a society to mature, it must consider kindness in the wider sense. “She’s a kind person” is entirely different from “she was kind to me”. While the former is a quality, the latter merely assumes a position as well as a random act. The quality is more important than the action because, effects of the action erodes with time. Thus kindness has to be realized and prioritized as an inherent quality in every person. How can a person exercise kindness if he believes it to exist only in certain situations (that which demands an action) and forget that it is a quality embedded in him? The best way I could think of defining it is as a supreme gift; “the gift, to be true, must be the flowing of the giver unto me, correspondent to my flowing unto him” as to quote Emerson. The only condition here is that of a heartfelt compassion. It is a virtue that associates with the goodness of human heart; an expression of love and gratitude irrespective of all social systems. The only precondition for kindness is love and hence any act of kindness is merely an expression of love and so the action in itself has little implication. So my gesture to the old man holds fine as long as it’s an expression of love. For any society to develop on this virtue, the roots must be from this refined understanding- what people actually thought as kindness could be pity, and they needn’t look for it any further than loving each other.
By Melvin Eapen
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