Partnership
Negative ideas have an attractive power. Negative ideas sweep people up and carry them along paths they would not travel if not under their influence. General William Tecumseh Sherman said, war is hell. Throughout history millions have learned this truth first hand, yet we continue to rally to either take part in or support the hell. It’s not our awareness of truth but our ignorance of it that makes us susceptible to negative ideas. Good news papers don’t sell. Negative news papers do. Negative idea movies are box office hits while films that promote peace, love and understanding find it difficult to make it to a theater. It’s not because we’re bad people. It’s because negative ideas have an attractive power and we don’t know how to get out from under their influence. Without positive ideas we are swept over the falls like a piece of driftwood in a raging river. Believing in one positive idea and acting on it can turn the tide in one’s life.
Last time I suggested we remember the kindness people showed one another after the September 11 disaster. It’s a positive idea that has the power to begin turning one’s life from a negative morass to a foothold for inner freedom from the attractive power of negative ideas. It won’t make negative ideas go away or stop the influence they have over humanity. If worked with it could help to lessen the influence negative ideas have on you. Because negative ideas do not require awareness to influence us they are powerful. Because positive ideas do require awareness and cooperation they are inherently more powerful than unconscious negative ideas. Positive ideas are more powerful precisely because they require our conscious participation. They tap into one of the greatest powers in the universe to which we have access. The power of alert inner awareness. Negative ideas attract people unconsciously. Positive ideas bring people together through conscious cooperation. It takes more consistent effort to be conscious than it does to go with the flow of the attracting power of negative ideas.
I’d like to extend an invitation to you. I invite you to partner with other people who might wish to entertain one positive idea. Let’s take as an example the simple idea of kindness. Remembering what power there is in acts of kindness we might attempt to do one act of kindness each day for a week. Just trying to remember to be kind will make a difference in our consciousness. Then, rather than let the attractive power of negative ideas suck us back down into unconscious reactions to events, we could aim for two acts of kindness each day for the second week. What will happen? I don’t know. Who will want to do this with me? I don’t know. This is simply an invitation to try an experiment--a partnership of kindness. It won’t stop war, crime, starvation or ignorance in the world. It probably won’t make featured content or featured weblog. Why should it? It’s a positive idea and it’s going to take effort. Besides, I’m interested in partners not recognition. If even the attempt helps to make you the tiniest bit more aware of how you interact with others it will be a good experiment. Here's a Podcast related to these ideas.
Comments (14)
yes!
I'll make that commitment. Blessings abound
I suffered from depression a few years back, and one thing that helped pull me out was writing in a diary each night three GOOD things that happened each day. Sometimes I really had to stretch to come up with even one, but usually I managed all three.
I think we must all learn to acknowledge the good in our lives, and if in order to become aware we need to make random acts of kindness, then I am all for it.
Count me in.
Yeah. In.
Already swimming in the pool! A small group of folks I know are at least wading in the waters of kindness, compassion and encouragement.
I do believe the time is here to grow this practice. You expressed the challenge very well. Thank you for writing.
Sounds like a plan!
one of the things I learned when I was pregnant with BigE 17 years ago (or so) was when I wasn't feeling happy or up or in a good frame of mind. I would go shopping...not to shop but because I would smile at someone that looked to be having a bad day or do a random act of kindness.....I always went home feeling much better. I still do that as often as I can get out of the house/apartment.
I love it, I am in and I already do it! I make sure to do one act of kindness towards someone each and every day. My Karma bank brimmeth over! and I feel glad to let someone in during a traffice jam or take my neighbor some fresh bread, it makes me feel good and them too!
I will make an effort to do this, James... I think it's a wonderful idea.
I like invitations! I remember the time I was still "new" with my present employer. I had not only changed jobs, but had moved more than 300 miles and moved in with my soon-to-be betrothed. One day, I came in after lunch and there was an invitation-sized envelop in my inbox. Cool! I opened it eagerly, unable to contain my smile and delight at thinking someone wanted to get to know me better, only to find it was a mandatory summons, disgused as a fun invitation, to the report to the conference room after work on a specific day to do an unpleasant task that all staff had been refusing to do when asked. It would be several years before I would regret the resentment I allowed to overshadow a much more positive way of responding; a choice I was in the habit of making--and all too often regretting--when confronted with challenges that didn't go my way. Funny, I was just thinking about this when I learned we had been "tricked" into inviting relatives to our new home away from home in the mountains. If I can manage to put my resent aside, I'm sure I will have a wonderful time--much better than the alternative--if I can rise above my petty need to control. And if I am successful (likelier now that I'm aware of it!), it will be with much effort and I will still feel like an amateur driver, awkward and tense, trying to learn smooth and safe responses to those bumps and challenges in the road. There will be that moment of opportunity I will have to resist the perfect comeback which doesn't always come easily to me in the first place, and I will want to tell someone, just to fire that round that had been loaded...and ultimately, the real win will be when I give up that duel in the first place...
Yes, I accept the challenge! Glad to see you back here.
i missed this post...i was working in a friends yard because her partner died last week of cancer and she knows nothing about gardening, nor does she have the time or energy to think about grass and plants right now...so, i volunteered to do it all for her. i'll keep this kindness challenge in the forefront, for sure
What a great idea, I want to play.
You're back! If I already knew this, please humour me, as I think I have early onset dementia or something. Think of it as your act of kindness to me. You know, I really do try to do this as a matter of course --not that I think "I have to do one kind thing today", but I try to treat others with kindness always. I'm sure I fail regularly, but I do try my best. Yes, despite all my talk of kicking people in the face, I'm a softy at heart. As an aside, some idiot in my city actually kicked someone in the face the other day. Not just any someone, either. A cop. Yeah, it didn't go over well.
I grew a garden this summer to help ease world hunger...well, at least so we could consume less (live simply so others may simply live kinda thing). I'm translating that as a indirect act of kindness...you can't have world peace when people go hungry. I foresee a blog swat coming my way...
Comments are closed.