Written by: Angela C M Cox, Executive Contributor
Executive Contributors at Brainz Magazine are handpicked and invited to contribute because of their knowledge and valuable insight within their area of expertise.
I confess I often wince, if not outright cringe, when I hear people casually say, “It costs nothing to be kind.” I understand the intent is to convey that it’s not difficult to be a decent human being when interacting with other human beings, so just be nice. It’s a good sentiment in general. Yes, please treat people with respect and decency as you move through the world, but there are two flaws in the no-cost philosophy.
First of all, niceness is not the same as kindness.
And second, kindness should cost something or why are we offering it to the world?
Niceness vs Kindness
Niceness is a social construct that is wielded by those in power to keep people from challenging the status quo. The rise of “Boss Babes” and “Bad Bitches” is a direct reaction to the construct of Niceness.
Be nice.
Play nice.
Act Nice.
Dress nice.
We’ve heard it our whole lives, especially anyone who isn’t a cis-het white man. To be other than “nice” is to be a rebel, an instigator, a troublemaker, or a problem child. The idea that we must act in a way that doesn’t push back against the patriarchy or established social norms only perpetuates systems that hurt those who do not hold traditional forms of power. Which is where kindness comes in.
Kindness is not some mealy-mouthed Pollyanna sitting around waiting to sprinkle fairy dust onto random strangers. Real kindness is powerful. It comforts the afflicted and afflicts the comfortable.
Kindness is empathy with its work clothes on. It sees people and situations in need of compassion and it acts on that. Kindness seeks justice. It holds abusers and bullies accountable. It goes to the heart of what it means to be human. Kindness means holding space for grief and pain without needing to fix the brokenness or offer solutions.
Kindness knows that to be kind to an abuser is to be unkind to the abused, so in this way, kindness is discerning and shrewd, far from the meek and weak image so many people want to ascribe to it.
The Cost of Kindness
True kindness, and its compassion counterpart empathy, require that we stretch our emotional muscles and work at understanding another person. Kindness means we work to see others and to understand what kindness means to them. This takes time and patience. It costs us something, but it adds true value and hope to a hurting world.
The wisdom of kindness helps us arrive at a place in which we understand that what feels like kindness to one person may not feel like kindness to another, and in this, it asks that we do some emotional labor to understand and treat others according to their needs and not just our own. Emotional labor costs us effort and energy, but when we dig deep to establish truly empathetic connections, we honor the needs of others even when they are different from our own.
If kindness costs us nothing, are we really engaging with others authentically and kindly? If kindness is free, then maybe the Golden Rule is enough? Treat others as you want to be treated regardless of what their actual need might be.
But it isn't enough. Truly radical kindness treats people the way they want and need to be treated. That’s the Platinum Rule. And that takes time and emotional labor and effort and maturity.
It costs something, yes, but that’s good and right that it should. Because if I give you something that is free, how does that make you feel? But if we give others the priceless gift of slowing down and seeing them and offering something they truly need, we remind them of their infinite value and worth as fellow human beings. We make the world safer, more inclusive, and more focused on addressing the root causes and less focused on dopamine-seeking performative acts.
This is deliberate kindness over random acts. It costs us something, and it should. ❤
Angela Cox, PhD, is an organizational effectiveness consultant and Founder of Three Kindnesses. For more information about Three Kindnesses, check out https://threekindnesses.com or follow us @3Kindnesses on Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn.
Angela C M Cox, Executive Contributor Brainz Magazine After beginning her career as a college professor, Dr. Angela Cox has spent two decades in HR and Learning and Development at Fortune 500 companies. From designing meaningful learning experiences to facilitating leadership development programs and consulting around employee engagement and organizational effectiveness, she was consistently focused on how to increase employee satisfaction and psychological safety through deliberate acts of kindness and inclusion. Despite an ever-growing list of skills and credentials, Angela and her neurodivergent brain often found it difficult to fit in and to find places where she could do her best work. Finally, after years of toning down her passion and shaving on her quirky edges to try and fit into a corporate mold, Angela co-founded Three Kindnesses in order to give others the permission she always wanted in her own workplace environments. Permission for people to be themselves, quirky edges and all. An emerging voice of encouragement and inspiration in the neurodivergent community and an ambassador for deliberate, radical kindness, Angela is also the author of two soon-to-be-released books on "How to Be Kind" and a contributing writer to Entrepreneur's Leadership Network.
