Kind

Our country has some tough, complicated decisions to make, some hard choices. That's nothing new – every generation, every single one, has been faced with hard choices. The fact that we're not very good at the hard things isn't what keeps me up at night. What's bothering me is the fact that we can't even do the easy things.

Consider a basketball team – from four-year-olds all the way to the pros. They get dressed in the locker room, run onto the court, and take turns making layups. And in practice, nothing else really happens until you know how to dribble the ball and make a layup.

If our country was a basketball team, let's face it, not only would we be missing layups, I'm not sure we'd be able to put our shoes, much less tie them.

Where am I going with this? I suggest we learn how to be kind.

I know, I know...kindness is a little out of fashion. I was talking with a friend last week about a guy we both went to school with who was back in town.

My friend said, “I was surprised, I hadn't seen him for years. He was really kind of mean. He'd say something to make someone feel bad and you'd see him smile and enjoy it a little.”

I said, “Yeah, he was like that in high school, too. I never really understood it.” And I never have.

Don't get me wrong, I've done some mean things in my life. Usually by accident, but I can remember a couple times it was on purpose. Luckily, those are the memories that pop up at 3:00 in the morning when I don't want to get any more sleep.

I think being kind is like the layups of life. Really. You need to get that move right before you take steps toward anything more complicated. Most pastors in the churches I've been in could preach indefinitely about the Sermon on the Mount. They wouldn’t need to touch on anything more theologically complicated and still be doing their job.

People don't want to be kind because they think it makes them look like a sap, an easy mark. That's just wrong. You can drive a hard bargain without being mean, you can fire someone without laughing at them, you can end a program without doing a victory dance. Living without kindness is sowing the seeds of your own destruction, because you're leaving in your wake a long line of people who wish you ill. “What goes around comes around” is not some sort of revolutionary thought, it's just the way of the world.

Don't confuse being tough with being mean. Some of the absolute toughest human beings I've ever been around were paragons of kindness.

In the end, Kurt Vonnegut summed it up nicely: “Hello babies. Welcome to Earth. It's hot in the summer and cold in the winter. It's round and wet and crowded. On the outside, babies, you've got a hundred years here. There's only one rule that I know of babies – Damn it, you've got to be kind.”

It's simple, but simple doesn't mean easy. It requires practice, just like a layup.

Copyright 2025 Brent Olson