Kindness Comes from Hearing Each Other

At the end of the day, you need someone who listens

 to you with no judgement.

                                              Payal Rohatgi

I have read a lot about the importance of storytelling lately – the power it has to open doors for understanding between people whose life paths have been different. I see great value in learning about someone else’s story as a powerful way to overcome the judgments we may have about others.

I also see the darker side of storytelling – the stories we tell in our minds about ourselves and others. Sometimes, those stories get in the way of our ability to actually hear the stories of others, as we simply overlay them with our preconceived notions of who they are.

We all do it to some extent. We can see it more easily in others than in ourselves.

I have a friend who has a negative view of African American people as a group, even though he has met some Black people whom he seems to care about. He is a kind person, and I thought that I could help him to expand his understanding by sharing a video that me gave insights into the challenges Black people often face in our culture.

The members of a church had invited a Black woman to share her story with them, so they could better understand the realities of her life. She calmly told of experiences that led her to feeling unsafe in the world and fearing for the safety of her children. Her story is a part of the fabric of our culture, and it gave me a glimpse into that part of our world that I had not seen before.

My friend’s response was quite different – “They’re always complaining,” he said. He had not heard the truth of her story.

Wow. I was speechless. We had heard the same words, but we had two different stories in our heads that colored what we heard. How we listen to others matters. Are we open to new information that leads us to better understanding or closed to anything that challenges our beliefs about who people are?

Storytelling is only half of the equation. Listening is the other half, and one without the other is an exercise in wishful thinking. Of course, most people who take the time to hear someone else’s story do so to expand their understanding, so it is important to keep telling our stories.

This led me to considering the stories we tell ourselves about who we are.

My friend had a view of himself that contributed to the way that he judged others. He had grown up with privileges not available to many people, and, for most of his life, had opportunities to pursue his dreams and create a good life. He saw himself as being honest and responsible and able to take care of himself, without asking other people to provide what he needed.

As most of us do to some extent, he responded to the actions of others by considering what he would do in their situation. Of course, he would never be in their situation, because it is happening in the context of their lives, not his. But we don’t stop to consider that. It is easy to jump to what we would do, and that lays the platform from which we judge someone else’s actions.

So, that brings me to how I see myself. This is where it gets tricky. At this point in my life, I see myself as being kind and curious about other people, so it is easier to understand them, no matter how they are showing up today. But that’s not all of who I am. I have my own judgments and dislikes, even though I would prefer not to.

I admit that I did not respond to my friend with the same kind of acceptance that I wanted him to give to others. I was willing to consider the life journey of other people before judging them, but I did not, in that moment, consider the factors in his life that had led him to hold his beliefs. I could hear the woman’s story with compassion, so why couldn’t he?

Wow. Time to look at myself.

This journey we are on – the kindness journey – if we take it seriously, we notice that it offers us many opportunities to grow, to become more of who we want to be. For me, living with kindness means having an open heart and being kind to everyone I meet – not just outwardly, but also within me.

If kindness is an expression of love in the world, then it has to begin with love within me. So, for me, that means dropping any judgments about others and seeing them, each on their unique life journey, doing the best they know how to do in this moment.

That applies to everyone. It means dropping any judgments that I may have that someone “should know better.” It means accepting people as they show up in this moment, even in their judgments, knowing that we are each on our own life journey and figuring it out as best we can as we go.

When it comes to storytelling, how we show up in the world is the loudest story we tell. That arises from the stories we tell ourselves – about who we are and who other people are.

Let’s be as kind as we can in all of those stories and let our lives unfold from there, so we can help to make the world around us a kinder place.

What are your thoughts?

If these ideas spoke to you, please share this post and leave a comment below.

We’re grateful that you are on this journey with us.

With love from our hearts to yours,

Pat and Larry