Kindness is a thing many of us could use nowadays. The period we're living in is probably the worst in terms of our mental health. 77% of professionals in the U.S. say they feel burnt out at work. Depression rates keep getting higher each year, too. According to a Gallup survey, 29% of Americans are living with lifetime depression. In 2015, that number was only 19%.
The problem is many people are still embarrassed or afraid to talk about the issues they face. According to McLean Hospital, people "believe they are unworthy or should be able to control their symptoms through willpower." That's where kindness comes in -- kindness to understand each other and help each other when the going gets tough.
Why exactly do we need kindness, you ask? Well, when someone's nice or sweet to us, it has a physical effect. Kind acts decrease our blood pressure and the levels of the stress hormone cortisol. It also has an impact on our mental health. Kindness boosts our levels of serotonin and dopamine.
When we show kindness, our brain may also release endorphins, the body's natural painkiller, and they increase feelings of well-being. Kind acts also help us feel less lonely and more connected to others. It may even be contagious, as we might be encouraged to do good, kind acts in return.
A veteran emergency physician and the author of The Power of Kindness: Why Empathy Is Essential in Everyday Life, Dr. Brian Goldman, posits that the current world, especially the digital space, is brimming with unkindness. "I think we are getting addicted to speed, being right, fast transactions, not tuning into others," he told Chatelaine.
"[We're] criticizing or mocking people who are slower, people who talk slower or take longer to formulate their thoughts," Dr. Goldman says. "It's as if quick wit is the only prized possession and the only prized attribute for social interactions. You see so often, the quick put-downs on Twitter that slay a person and embarrass them."
This need to always dunk on somebody and have a witty comeback presupposes that kindness is a weakness. Being earnest often gets conflated with being cheesy or cringy. Irony and sarcasm are the rulers of the Internet, aren't they? So why, if kindness is so good for us, do we run away from it so much?
As Charlotte Armitage, a media and business psychologist, explained to Stylist, it's because in order to show kindness, we have to be vulnerable. "Those who go out of their way to help another are seen as weak because it appears as though they are putting the needs of someone else before their own needs," she explained.
