Be kind

"Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle." ~Believed to be said by the Rev. John Watson, who went by the pen name Ian Maclaren

Today, I met a brilliant young lady, one who reminded me so much of myself when I was younger.

On my way to interview her, my mind had been mulling around some heavy thoughts. After interviewing her, I was heading to the courthouse, to cover a case of man who is accused of murdering his wife in their home.

Yesterday, a student in another state took a gun to school, in an effort to shoot classmates. Thankfully, he was stopped. This is the third or fourth attempted (or successful) school shooting this year.

Last night and this morning, I saw two different stories of people who have stolen dogs — one in need of life-saving medication.

Recently a friend, added me to a group where the sole purpose is to share cases of child abuse.

The list goes on. My heart is so heavy. I’m so tired and exhausted at dealing with all this hard stuff.

I just can’t understand how people can be so cruel to each other. Beyond the worldwide issues of famine and disease, what about the day-to-day things we do to each other. Stealing, neglecting, abusing and killing pets and children and other people.

Why?

Why do we do these things to one another?

How? I get sad when I’m faced with a creepy crawly in my house, because I feel bad that I might have to kill them. I try to carry them outside first. I can’t fathom how people can be purposefully cruel to one another.

And things have bombarded me on social media.

So I’m trying to cut back. I know that might sound terrible, but there comes time where I have to turn off my computer.

Maybe that’s burying my head in the sand, in some people’s eyes.

But to me, it’s saving me.

We can’t ignore the horrible aspects of life. We have to make the abusers pay, we have to save the children and the animals and people that we can save.

But at the end of the day, sometimes, we have to turn off the images. We have to step back and we have to be present in our lives. We have to focus on our own families, children and pets. We have to invest in our spouses.

And we have to turn all that bad over to God.

That’s the only fix for all of this. We have to invest in God and make sure to put Him first. I don’t know how He takes on all of that; I can only imagine it hurts his heart, too.

And while we can’t snap our fingers and make life all bunnies and rainbows, we can each do our part to make things better.

We can stop being cruel. We can stop beating each other over the head with our anger. Stop screaming at one another over our disagreements. Take a deep breath. Take a step back.

We can’t all agree. But we don’t have to disagree so violently. Just because someone disagrees with you, doesn’t mean you have to hate them.

You might be amazed how much alike you really are.

I have a niece who is close to two. She’s a super sensitive kid, who cries easily.

My mom says that Miss C reminds her a lot of me. Maybe that’s true — I certainly take everything in life to heart these days. That’s tough, doing what I do for a living. It’s exhausting, too.

I don’t remember being like that as a child, so I hope Miss C doesn’t either. I remember being more like the young lady I met today, wide-eyed and full of dreams. I have notebooks full of stuff I wrote as a child.

At the time, it never crossed my mind to be a writer, but I loved to doodle and jot. I remember writing my own songs, poems, and lots of journal entries.

I wonder when a person loses that level of creativity and excitement about the world.

I know, I’ve seen kids in my own life that have started to lose that, while others seem to keep it forever. How else do you explain Silicon Valley? What about all the artists of the world?

My husband says I’m still like that in many ways — despite it all, I’ve managed to maintain a bit of innocence and wonder about the world. He says I see things in a way that others don’t and I expect people to behave in a way they unfortunately won’t.

Maybe that’s the other reason I take it all to heart. Because I expect people to be better than they often turn out to be. To be kinder.

Do me a favor, friends. Try being kind. You don’t have to be dishonest when you disagree. But you can do it in a kind way.