Are real people as kind as you characters? I mean, it's not just yours, other fictional people are like that too, but what do YOU say? Are you guys actually like that on the inside?

today i got a coffee on my lunch break and a man had his daughter on his hip and two coffees in his hands and he held the door open for me anyway

i went to go pick up a skirt that was being held for me and the employee said to me “uhg, i’m so tired, the coffee hasn’t kicked in yet” and i said “your hair is so beautiful” because it was long and red and shiny and had blown out curls and she perked up and said “thanks! it’s to distract from the fact that i didn’t put on makeup this morning” 

i was driving home and i realized i was in the wrong lane and i needed to move over and a car slowed down so i could merge in front of them

that was just today

whether or not you think people are kind is a sort of confirmation bias, i think

if you go through life expecting people to be terrible, that’s what you’ll remember, that’s what you’ll focus on

but if you go through life looking for kindness, that’s what you’ll find

overtip your waiters. let the car go in ahead of you. smile at the homeless person and give them your spare change. compliment people. 

you yourself are likely never more than one rushed morning away from a bad mood, one missed paycheck away from suffering, one accident away from ruin

you are probably not a politician or a ceo or a god. you cannot remake the world in your own image

but you can make other people’s lives easier and softer in small, effortless ways that cost you nothing. you can be the silver lining not just for your friends and family but for hundreds of thousands of strangers you haven’t even met yet. life is nothing but one opportunity after another to both show and be shown kindness

life can be cruel. people can be terrible. 

but the simplest way to increase the number of kind people in the world is to be one