Reflections on the Meaning of Kindness

Practice kindness,

It is a strength greater than any other

Connecting others, collaborating with others,

It is a uniting force, like love.

But there will be people who might

Call you out on your acts of kindness,

Claiming that there is a malignant intent.

After all-- kindness, like love,

Has its duality.

Its darker side,

Its misunderstandings.

If only we as a people understand this, I hope,

Though I understand that may come off as

Self-demanding, or

Self-righteous,

Can we truly understand true kindness...

Yes, a sort of Plato's realm of ideas,

I understand,

But I believe-- like the purifying fire or the crucible,

The we can truly learn over time to learn

And discern true kindness.

It is not easy,

And it is not permanent--

There will always be new people in this

World after all,

Being born and thus unlearned.

But as a people-- humanity,

I am sure we have come very far.

Yes, as time and humanity progresses,

There will always be new and novel situations--

Yes, the patterns may be there,

Stories of old echoing back at us in the present

And future,

But told with different characters,

Different voices,

And echoed back in a slightly diffeirent way.

But alas,

I must focus on the here and now.

This message, this intention,

It is ever-changing... but its essence,

I hope it is conveyed.

On that note,

However,

I feel that I must clear the air

Of any ambiguities.

Love has often been connected to venom & poison,

In the right amounts, in appropriate amounts,

It can be good.

Sweet Venus herself would understand,

The secret of love's venomous nature,

But good and yet possibly bad--

We hope it brings the best in others.

And yet we cannot ascertain whether

What we have done is truly good.

But that's okay-- it is the experience that matters.

The experience of love,

And hopefully through that

We come to refine and redefine

Our definition of love.

And so it is with kindness,

Other may think of kindness as a

Sign of weakness.

But it is a strength,

And yes there may be weaknesses--

But I hope that there can be a balance between

The two, strengths and weaknesses that is.

The weakness comes when one is

Being victimized due to the nature of the

Recipient of kindness-- how the reuceiver reacts

To the giver of kindness.

A sort of "biting the hand that feeds" scenario.

Alas, I must digress-- the weakness to this

I revealed, but the solution--

Can there be one?

But perhaps to be kind to oneself...

At least. The may be the solution,

And yet it goes contrary to conventional wisdom.

(One of Aesop's fables warns this, the fable of the "A Gardener and His Dog," as well as a Buddhist parable of "The Monk and the Scorpion." The former is less forgiving, as is the nature of the way Aesop's fables are presented, but the Buddhist parable goes to say that we must endure and perservere in spite of another's nature being incompatible to ours-- in this case being harmed as a result of our act of kindness. We must perservere in our acts of kindness as a message to the world-- and to not copy and fall into the same destructive behavior of another's nature-- at least in the way I have interpreted it.

There is a sort of ontological dissonance with the quote supposedly attributed to Aesop in "No act of kindnes, no matter how small, is ever wasted," with the fable of "A Gardener and His Dog," but the Buddhist parable mentioned earlier seems to complete the message behind Aesop's intentions. I suspect that his fable has been corrupted or that this quote is misattributed to him. It may be unlikely that the fable is corrupted, but it is still a possibility. The reason in saying that it is not corrupted is due to the fact that most of Aesop's fables follow this pattern of unforgiveness in one's follies, and this particular Aesop's fable was no different. Perhaps, supposedly, as I have read in the Penguin Classics version, it was simply meant to be taken as a joke. But in either case, the way it was taught must have been different than the way it was read! )