Infectious. Just the sound of this word may be enough to make your skin crawl. Infectious: the state of being contaminated with some form of disease. But what if that disease were happiness? Doesn't sound quite as bad, does it?
The truth is, each of us have many opportunities every day to infect one another with happiness because happiness is contagious. Think about it. When you are around someone who is hopelessly happy, your spirits automatically rise at least a little. Happiness is easy to spread; just be kind. Open the door for a stranger; hold a child up to a water fountain for a drink; listen to someone who is discouraged.
Spreading happiness will be easier for some than others, because different things make an individual happy, and some of us are more people-oriented than others. Remember that everyone needs something from someone at some time. The little things we do to encourage each other can make the rough times more bearable.
The next time a distressed person crosses your path, infect him! Happiness is best when it is shared, and what goes
around, comes around. What you share today may come back to infect you tomorrow. Simple deeds of kindness can go a long way. Maybe you will start an epidemic!
“Practice random kindness and senseless acts of beauty.” Imagine a woman so enchanted by these words as she saw them on a doormat that, as she drove through a tollbooth on her way home, she paid for her own car and the six cars that were lined up behind her. Sound too good to be true? It isn’t. That is a true story.
The quotation above was written by Anne Herbert. She isn’t a psychologist conducting a study or a philosopher or any kind of activist. She is just a person giving advice, and her advice just happens to be pretty inspiring.
Many of us may think that the world today is nothing but a shambles. With crime rates rising as they are and trust being sold to the highest bidder everywhere you look. Newspapers record horrific events everyday and even the movie makers have resorted to bringing back the “Dark Knight”(Batman) as a means of conveying some warped sense of hope for ridding the evil in our world. Yet, in the midst of destruction of good faith and obstruction of justice, these words of advice call to you, “Practice random kindness and senseless acts of beauty.”
Every one of us knows just how relieved we are when a seemingly bad situation turns good, or the lift our spirits get when someone does something kind for us without our expecting it. These are the things that make us believe that good is still out there, that make us want to do something for someone else, that make us want to “practice random kindness and senseless acts of beauty.”
Ms. Herbert further states that kindness is just as contagious as crime, saying “Kindness can build on itself as much as violence can.” This holds with the theory that we all have emotional bank accounts with each other. When someone we don’t know wrongs us in some way, it is a withdrawal from the emotional bank account we have with all strangers. Too many of these types of withdrawals can make us lose faith in people. However, when someone we don’t know goes out of his or her way to do something nice for us, he or she has just made a very large deposit into that account, a deposit that builds trust and eliminates fear.
Journalist Adair Lora admonishes, “Like all revolutions, guerrilla goodness begins slowly, with a single act.” Begin your revolution to build trust, hope, and kindness in your community today: “Practice random kindness and senseless acts of beauty.”
You might have heard an ancient saying, "Anyone who is among the living has hope." Even those who feel that they have no hope have something that drives them on. Behind every hope resides the vision of a great and compelling dream, something that keeps us going forward in life. We must understand that great dreams are what give birth to powerful and persevering hope. Hope is a spiritual fuel that activates and stimulates the depths of our soul and mind. The hope of our vision is what compels us to keep going when we really feel like giving up. Hope allows us to persevere through the storms of life. In essence, it is a survival mechanism for us all, for all of us need the power of hope to survive this life. Remember that with hope come to us peace, love, joy, patience, faith, kindness, gentleness, and so much more, all of which contribute to the reality and foundation of a powerful dream, all of which we should pack and carry with us for the journey of life.
Often obstacles or walls cause people to become discouraged and say a task cannot be done. They fixate on the wall and how it impedes the usual course by which a thing may be accomplished. Often difficult circumstances form the primary obstacle perceived by people to hinder their work.
The Apostle Paul gives a fascinating insight into his life in 1 Corinthians 16:8-9 when he says, "But I will tarry at Ephesus until Pentecost. For a great door and effectual is opened unto me, and there are many adversaries."
The word "adversary" #480 antikeimai means, " to be set over against, to oppose or withstand." Note that the Apostle says in his work at Ephesus that they were "many" adversaries! By most people's standard that multitude of opposition would have formed a tremendous wall in their thinking. The Apostle Paul did not see it that way at all; he saw opportunity, which he calls a "great door," rather than a wall of opposition. He actually adds a further emphasis saying that the door is "great" (megas)- and "effectual" (energas - or active, powerful), and that it was open. The spiritual potential for the Gospel of God was not diminished by the opposition. Our perception of the favorable or unfavorable circumstances reflect our root attitudes. The age old story of the shoe salesmen sent to a Pacific Island comes to mind.
One salesman wrote back after one week and said, "I am coming home; no one here wears shoes." The other salesmen placed a massive order and said, "Everyone here needs shoes." The Apostle Paul knew that all men need the Gospel, Romans 3:23, 6:23, and 1:16. This firmly held knowledge caused his circumstances to be evaluated in light of that truth.
When Abimelech was confronted by fortified walls of opposition in Judges 9, he showed his men how to burn them down. But those walls were also an opportunity for his own destruction. He had sinned against God, and God used one of those "walls" as the means to bring justice.
The spies of Israel reported back to Israel that the Promised land truly flowed with milk and honey, but that they could not take it because of the giants in the land that made them look like grasshoppers. Joshua and Caleb knew about the giants because they had seen the same thing. However, Joshua and Caleb remembered God's promise to go and fight for them and urged the people to attack the "wall" anyway. The people refused to their own regret and judgment. Thirty-nine years later, Joshua led the Israelites into Canaan and, because of his faith, God showed Joshua how strong walls could crumble if His ways were obeyed.
The simple lesson is that circumstances should not form a wall that keeps us from seeking to accomplish a task. God can give us wisdom and strength to find a way under, over, around, or through those things we face.
If the "wall" is a command of God's Word, praise the Lord that He took the opportunity to teach us when we went off course. If wise counsel says this may be a bad course again, praise the Lord for learning an option to avoid in the future. James 1 tells us to rejoice even in our trials.
Each of us will journey on life's road once, and it is on this road that each of us will experience what life is truly all about. Despite all the ups and downs in life, each of us has been endowed with an incredible ability to dream big dreams. Our dreams are what make up the treasure in our lives. They are what give life purpose, meaning, and fulfillment. For some, that treasure might be a better relationship, starting your own business, getting an education, having more time for family, or living with a sense of peace and hope.
Big dreams are what inspired people like Thomas Edison to keep searching for ways to make the lightbulb work or the Wright brothers to get the first airplane to take flight. Because people dreamed big dreams, men and women have been launched into space, cures for illnesses have been discovered, walls in countries have come down. Dreams are what stretch the mind to go beyond limitations and can transform the invisible into the visible, the impossible into the possible.
Another day, another depressing news report, another couple of personal disasters, another reason to doubt the goodness of the world. Does this seem to be an accurate description of how you feel about the world around you? It doesn't have to be like this. All it takes is a little bit of kindness to turn everything around. “But, who will add the kindness?” you ask. The answer is you.
All you have to do is give a few kind words to someone else. This will make that person feel good and want to pass on a few kind words to someone else. And, a chain reaction will be started. It is kind of like throwing a pebble into a river—the pebble will not merely fall to the bottom, but it will cause a rippling effect in the water. Journalist, Adair Lora, describes this phenomena as a “positive anarchy, a gentle disorder, a sweet disturbance.” What are you disturbing? All the forces in the world contribute to depressing news reports and personal disasters. Sometimes all it takes is a few nice words from someone to lift the cloud of a bad day or to help someone else hang in there when the going gets rough.
Anne Herbert urges, “If you think there should be more of something, do it — randomly.” Most of us would agree that there should be a lot more kindness in the world, but most of us are probably waiting for someone else to put it there. We all need to realize that kindness is contagious. It spreads even though we may not see it. A few kind words said today may save someone from giving up hope tomorrow. Make them your kind words.
Start an epidemic of kindness and don't give up! Anne Herbert goes on to state that “Kindness can build on itself as much as violence can.” All of us have seen enough of what violence can do to our world, and in the real world, we can't rely on some “caped crusader” to come to our rescue. We need to take the initiative ourselves and put a ripple of kindness into our waiting world.
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