One of my closest girlfriends has a saying: ‘I’ve no intention of being nice, but I’m always kind’. I think in another life, she’d have been an old school matron. She’s the sort of woman you need in a crisis. Calm, forthright and yes, very kind. But when it comes to pleasantries, she doesn’t waste her time. She couldn’t care less for the opinions of others, and many find her marmite (in that they either love or hate her). I asked her once why she stood by that saying, and her reply has stayed with me ever since: ‘Because when I say I’m being kind, I mean to myself first’. She makes sure she is kind to herself in every way she can be, every day.
Her view, which I very much hope will be adopted by as many of you as possible, is that you cannot pour from an empty cup. If you want to be kind to other people, it starts with self-kindness. But kindness doesn’t mean hedonism. It might feel nice, for instance, to have cream cake every afternoon. But if you’re diabetic and struggling with health woes, it’s not actually kind. There’s a big difference between indulgence and kindness.
Over the years, I’ve come to believe that true kindness can only really come with honesty about your life and what you most need. I learned during my menopause that the kindest thing I could start doing, for example, was saying ‘no’.
Radical honesty is a therapeutic movement that has self-kindness at its heart. Created by Brad Blanton PHD, it works on the idea that the kindest thing you can do for yourself is to stop lying to yourself. Being radically honest with yourself isn’t easy. You might need the support of a therapist to move you from your current viewpoints into a more ‘honest’ mindset. The movement encourages you to be honest, both with yourself and others, in order to foster more authentic connections.
For example – say your husband cooks a meal. You want to be nice to him, so you tell him it’s lovely, but you didn’t enjoy it at all. Radical honesty means telling the truth kindly if you hate it; because otherwise you’ll only end up eating it more and possibly resenting him for cooking it. You might suppress that resentment and it might come out as passive aggression in a different way. Does that sound nice? No. It’s unkind to both of you.
But it’s hard to undo a lifetime of conditioning, so you need to be kind to yourself and start small. Most of all remember, you get one life. Do you really want ‘she was very nice’ in your eulogy? Or do you want ‘she lived an authentic life, and was kind to herself and everyone around her’? I know which I’m choosing.
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