World Kindness Day

Let’s Celebrate World Kindness Day!

By: Chuck Lee

World Kindness Day is celebrated annually on Nov. 13. So mark your calendars!!

Let’s celebrate World Kindness for an entire week from Nov. 9-13.

It is an international movement with no political, commercial or religious affiliations.

First launched in 1998 by the World Kindness Movement, which was formed at a 1997 Tokyo conference of like-minded kindness organizations from around the world.

The U.S. is one of the 28 nations involved in The World Kindness Movement.

Kindness is a fundamental part of the human condition which bridges the divides of race, religion, politics and zip codes.

According to Gulf News, “it is a day that encourages individuals to overlook boundaries, race and religion and any other challenging issues at hand.”

The purpose of World Kindness Day is to highlight good deeds in the community and workplace, focusing on the positive power and the common thread of kindness that binds us.

Kindness is a strength…it is much more difficult and courageous to be kind than it is to hate. today!

Here are some effortless ways to make kindness part of your every day: • Decide to be kind. Each morning, tell yourself that you WILL FOCUS ON BEING KIND! • Increase your awareness. Start noticing kindness; it’s all around you, if you just look for it. • Be appreciative…attitude of gratitude • Look for opportunities to be kind • SMILE • Be kind to yourself • Be kind to the people closest to you • Keep a kindness journal

The challenge that I have for each of you is to practice kindness each day and especially DOT Kindness week (11/9/20 – 11/13/20) because practicing kindness does not cost us anything, it is CONTAGIOUS and should also be provided to others UNCONDITIONALLY! GET CAUGHT SHOWING AS MUCH KINDNESS AS POSSIBLE!!

I will be in touch with all of you with more kindness information and examples how we can practice kindness as a group as we move closer to our DOT Kindness Week.

If you have any other thoughts, ideas or Kindness success stories that you may want to share then please email me at charles.tw.lee@ hawaii.gov.