Donna Cameron
author of A Year of Living Kindly
Me: What motivated you to begin your year of living kindly?
Donna: When I started researching and writing about kindness in January of 2015, it was a very different world. My intention was to devote a year to understanding kindness and trying to become a kinder person. I was raised to be nice, but I had come to see that “nice” and “kind” are very different. Nice is safe. I was tired of settling for nice. Kind requires courage, risk, vulnerability, mindfulness, and a good deal of practice. I quickly saw that it isn’t something one incorporates into their life for one year and then moves on to the next thing—salsa dancing or playing the flugelhorn—I saw that kindness was what I wanted to practice for as long as I live.
Me: What surprised you the most about your journey?
Donna: Oh, so many surprises! One is that science has shown both incivility and kindness to be contagious—literally contagious. They spread from one person to the next like a virus. So, each of us has a choice in which contagious we want to spread and what kind of world we want to live in. That knowledge makes me aware that every choice I make and every action I take—or choose not to take—has consequences.
Another welcome surprise has been seeing how many people—of all ages and backgrounds—are eager to bring more kindness into our world.
Me: What is the most difficult thing about being kind?
Donna: Leaving the safety of our comfort zones and extending kindness often involves risk—our action might be misunderstood or rejected. We may appear awkward or clumsy; we may call unwanted attention to ourselves. Do it anyway. Take the risk and you’ll inspire others to take similar risks.
Learning to pause is a key kindness skill, but it’s hard. If we’re attacked or spoken to rudely, our first impulse is to respond in the same manner. If we can practice pausing—thinking about what might have triggered the attack, offering the benefit of the doubt, asking who we want to be in that moment—we can totally change the dynamic of the interaction. Just because someone else may be behaving like a jerk doesn’t mean we should, too.
Me: Share your best advice for living a more kind life.
Donna: Practicing simple skills like pausing, paying attention, and withholding judgment (simple, but not necessarily easy!) brings so much more kindness into our lives. Practice is key here: just like playing the piano or tennis, we get better with practice. Accept that there will be times when you fall short, when kindness is hard to muster. We’re not aiming for perfection, just for doing our best to increase the kindness in our world. Remember, too, that an essential element of that is showing kindness toward ourselves.
Me: What’s the biggest misconception about kindness?
Donna: That it’s weak and inconsequential, that it doesn’t make a difference. That kind people are spineless and ineffectual. The opposite is true. Kind people are the strongest and most courageous among us. They’re willing to take a risk, to face rejection or embarrassment. They’re willing to make themselves vulnerable in service to a better world. It’s something bullies and unkind people don’t yet understand.
Me: Where are you on your kindness journey? What are your plans for the future?
Donna: I’m still learning and I expect I will be a student of kindness for as long as I’m on the planet. For the immediate future, i.e., 2020, my hope is to be a voice of civility during this contentious election year—through my writing, my speaking, and my actions. We have become so polarized and demonized that we no longer listen to one another; we no longer offer the benefit of the doubt; we make quick and harsh judgments. We are going to need to relearn civility—and that means recognizing that without kindness, we can’t have healthy families, workplaces, communities, or nations.
A Year of Living Kindly was also featured in 10 Books about Striving for a Better World.
What suggestions do you have about living kindly? Please leave them in the comments.
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