Leading with Kindness

Hi meaningful leader,

I hope you had a restful or fun weekend, or a cool combination of both. And I hope your week is going smoothly. On my side of the world, it’s been raining on and off for two weeks now, but I don’t mind the rain at all, and my garden surely appreciates it.

As the world around us is going bonkers, I wanted to use this space to hone in into the topic of kindness, because all of us, without exception, can use some right this very moment for sure.

So many things are going on and we may agree with some and completely disagree with others. Especially, at work, we may encounter differences of opinions, be exposed to core value and beliefs that are opposing to ours. We may be enduring lack of empathy or support; and all of these can cause us to feel disengaged and in some cases isolated and even lonely.

Serving and respecting the people we agree with is easy peasy, but as leaders, we are called to serve and respect all, which means especially people who think differently than us. You see, the difference between true leaders and the rest of the population, is selflessness. While each person focuses on their own life, perspective, drama, trauma, goals, ideals, beliefs, agendas, etc., leaders are called to focus on others, and away from themselves.

Empathy and kindness are extremely powerful in relationship building; and as I said before, relationship building is the basic ingredient for team building. As leaders, loving others and caring for their well-being should be our why. Kindness is not a weakness, on the contrary. Kindness, especially in the face of unkindness, requires courage and strength.

• Strong people are kind
• Confident people are kind
• Grateful people are kind
• True leaders are kind

Regardless of what hand we’ve been dealt in life, we can never go wrong when we’re kind to another human being. If people have been kind, generous and loving to you, then you are now paying it all forward. Conversely, if your path has been rough, unkind, and lonely, then you give to others in kindness what your lacked, needed and craved. You see, what we give to others multiplies; and the more kindness we give, the more healing we receive.

My friend, kindness is like a muscle, the more we exercise it, the stronger it’ll become. And as a result, we’ll become more grateful, more expectant, more intentional, and way more engaged. It’s easy to criticize others and to allow our self-righteousness to boost our ego and pat us in the back, but the truth is, nobody has it absolutely right. We all make mistakes, we all struggle, and we all have a long way to go when it comes to growth. Yet with kindness and compassion to self and to others, the load will always become lighter and more manageable.

I want to invite you this week to be intentional about acting in kindness. It doesn’t have to be complicated…Open the door for someone, pay for a stranger’s a cup of coffee, let the person behind you pay first at the supermarket and see kindness unfold. I truly believe that we have the power to change the world, maybe not the whole world, but we can definitely change someone’s world for the better.

I hope you found value here today; if you did, please invite a friend over and subscribe to the blog. It helps me in spreading these messages and reaching other leaders out there.

Have an amazing rest of your week and God bless,

Maria