Kindness is something that is available to us in almost every interaction we have throughout our day and without even realizing it, we are also searching for some type of kindness embedded within our interactions with others. In Danusha Lameris’s poem, “Small Kindnesses”, she explains that we are seeking for small acts of kindness not just from others but ourselves as well. She writes, “We want to be handed our cup of coffee hot, and to say thank you to the person handling it. To smile at them and for them to smile back. For the waitress to call us honey when she sets down the bowl of clam chowder, and for the driver in the red pick-up truck to let us pass” (Lameris). We may not recognize it, but we all get a boost of happiness when interactions Lameris just listed happen throughout our day. In some situations, people may be having a bad day and need something to cheer them up. David Foster Wallace in his speech known as “This is Water” explains this kind of mindset where “I can choose to force myself to consider the likelihood that everyone else in the supermarket’s checkout line is just as bored and frustrated as I am, and that some of these people probably have harder, more tedious and painful lives than I do” (Wallace). This kind of thinking can be a great way for us to be able to remember and look for any way we can to do an act of kindness for others.
