THIS week I received a card from a reader of my column. She told me that she reads my column every week and so I have no doubt she is reading this.
 
Thank you for your card and please know I will be in touch. There’s just something about the kindness of strangers that touches the deepest part of our souls. Kindness has this amazing ability to interrupt our day, our attitudes, our cynicism, and our discouragements.
 
Matthew tells us ‘so in everything do to others what you would have them do to you’ (Matt 7:12). In a world that is so often cruel, we are called to be kind.

Kindness can heal. Kindness can encourage. Kindness can lift the spirit of our neighbours. What a difference the world would be if we lived as a people of kindness?

Here are just a few simple ways others have been kind to me –messages of support and encouragement, cooked meals during difficult times, a gift of a good book or good wine, their time to listen and journey with me and so on.
 
So here’s the kindness challenge to all of us…
• Who can you be kind to this week?
• What ways can you reach out in kindness?
• To whom can you send a word of encouragement/ thankfulness?
 
You can give your time, your attention and your gifts to kindness. I think so often we are focused on being right rather than being kind. Let’s embrace this week with a spirit of kindness. Let’s look for opportunities to make the lives of other people better. The words of Gandhi ring true, ‘In a gentle way you can shake the world.’