Stories of Kindness from Around the World

When I first came to Kindspring I was recovering from depression and anxiety attacks. KS helped me to see beyond my immediate field of vision, and the inspirational stories of kindness renewed my outlook on life and the world in general. I had come from a period in my life which was pretty much summed up by these words from Tolkien which I read almost daily and often clung onto,

Frodo: “I can’t do this, Sam”
Sam: “I know. It’s all wrong. By rights we shouldn’t even be here. But we are.
It’s like in the great stories, Mr Frodo, the ones that really mattered. Full of darkness and danger, they were. And sometimes you didn’t want to know the end, because how could the end be happy? How could the world go back to the way it was when so much bad had happened? But in the end, it’s only a passing thing this shadow. Even darkness must pass. A new day will come, and when the sun shines, it will shine out all the clearer.
Those were the stories that stayed with you, that meant something, even if you were too small to understand why. But I think, Mr Frodo, I do understand. I know now. Folk in those stories had lots of chances of turning back, only they didn’t. They kept going, because they were holding onto something.”
Frodo: “What are we holding onto, Sam?”
Sam: “That there’s some good in this world, Mr Frodo… and it’s worth fighting for.”

I still love this quote. Even today as I re-read it for the hundredth time, it reminds me that we truly are on some sort of adventure. And it is something that I do need to be reminded of periodically.

We’re sometimes overwhelmed by the amount of noise and tumult which the world’s media makes about events, sad and sorrowful as they are, the media would have you think that it is they that make the world go round, or that something other than Love (perfect, unconditional, blissful Love) is in control.

And all the while kindness seems to go un-noticed and un-sung, though as we all know, that is a long way far from the case, for how can we tell of our heroic deeds of a simple smile, a kind word, a hand held, deeds which we are already blessed with in the doing of?

And these are indeed courageous deeds, smiling when you’d rather cry, getting up when you’d rather stay in bed, reaching out with a helping hand or a kind word not knowing how or if it will be received well.

I once heard that “The purpose of friendships is to help one another grow and mature – sharpening us into who we never dreamed we could be.” So I thank you all for the friendship of the KS family.