A thought on kindness

Everyone knows the saying " Treat others the way you want to be treated." My parents told us this on numerous occasions as a children, mainly in relation to some sort of sibling dispute. As we got older they would use this simple phrase as they taught us how to interact with our friends and strangers. There is nothing complicated about it, just to the point, be nice to people.

I recently have decided I think that adults should use the phrase " Treat others the way you would want to be treated on the worst day of our life or at a time when you are going through hardest thing you have ever faced." I know it isn't as catchy and not as simple so probably not good for the kids. But as adults this is what we should strive for. At my job I routinely am working with people who are going through the hardest thing they have ever faced and often on the worst day of their lives ( i.e. the day they child is diagnosed with cancer, seizures, or some other horrible unforeseen thing). So at work I try to treat my patients and families the way I had thought I would want to be treated during such a time. Often things beyond my control prohibit me from being able to make their lives easier such as when I have to tell them "I don't know when the doctor will be here," "No we don't have the test results back yet," " I'm sorry but your child will have to stay another day" ect. ect.

Recently, I have been put in their shoes as I am currently going through the hardest thing I have ever faced. And turns out the words and actions of strangers carry greater weight now for some reason. The simplest thing, whether it is kind or mean, hits me much harder. For example, after my long shift at work yesterday I accidentally got on the elevator going down instead of up in the parking garage. Not a big deal, I rode it down to street level and then back up to my floor. But after I hit the button for the floor and it didn't light up the people on the elevator said, " That isn't going to light up, we are going down" to which I responded, "It's been a long day," thinking that would be the end of it. But they said " Also, there is a big arrow outside the elevator that lights up showing you that it was going down." Why do you have to be hateful about such a simple thing? There have been other instances of strangers saying or doing things that are kind as well, but that situation in the elevator and a few other insensitive things said by strangers led me to think about the need for the change to the common phrase.

You can't pick out the people in a crowd who are going through something terrible or who are going through something amazing for that matter. And the simplest things you do or say to them, kind or not, could make or break their day or their week. I believe that everything happens for a reason and I spent a lot of time in prayer trying to find a reason for why my baby has to go through something so hard. So far I haven't gotten an answer to that and Zach reminds me that maybe the reason is for Zane to find out, not us. But this lesson has shown itself to me over the past few weeks and I am taking it to heart as something good coming from my difficult time. I thought I would share it with all of you, give it some thought. Thanks for all of your kind words and actions over the past months they have carried great weight in our lives!