What’s the kindest thing someone has ever done for you?
To me, kindness is not just a word, nor does it simply mean feeling sorry for someone. Kindness means something much deeper to me.
Sometimes, something a person says stays with us so deeply that we remember it even when we are going through the hardest times in our lives, when we are struggling to find a way out.
And sometimes, a person does not help us by speaking gently or lovingly. Sometimes, they help us by scolding us.
Once, I was travelling for an exam. A person got on the bus and started selling something. At the same time, the bus began to move, so he tried to get off quickly. The bus conductor started shouting at him.
Looking at the situation, all the passengers seemed to think that the conductor was angry because the person was making the bus stop again and again.
But after some time, the driver told us that the man had an injury on his leg. In his hurry, he had not paid attention to it, but the conductor knew about his injury. That was why he was angry. He wanted the bus to stop completely so that the man could get off safely.
That small incident made me think.
Maybe someone does not always have to speak to us lovingly to show that they care. Sometimes, even their scolding can be another form of kindness.
That incident also reminded me of my school days.
There was a time when one of my teachers started telling me to stay away from some of my friends. She probably felt that I was unable to maintain the necessary distance from some of my classmates. So, she started keeping me busy at school by giving me some extra work.
Not all of that work was related to my studies.
At that time, I used to think, “She has become so strict. Why does she always give me extra work?”
I could not understand her behaviour.
But after a few days, I came to know something about those same classmates that was not right.
That was when I finally understood why my teacher had been behaving that way.
At that time, her scolding and strictness did not feel like kindness to me. I thought she was being unnecessarily harsh. But later, I realized that there was concern for me behind that strictness.
Perhaps kindness does not always appear with a smile.
Sometimes, it comes in a strict voice.
Sometimes, it is hidden behind someone’s scolding.
And sometimes, it appears in a decision that we strongly dislike at the time.
I don’t think we always have to recognize kindness at the exact moment it happens.
Some forms of kindness take time to understand.
Sometimes, we understand years later that something someone did for us was actually done because they cared about us.
And there is another form of kindness—when someone’s words stay with us.
Sometimes, a simple sentence spoken by someone becomes so deeply rooted in our minds that it comes back to us during difficult times. When we cannot see a way out of a situation, something we heard years ago can suddenly give us the strength to keep moving forward.
Perhaps we never know exactly when we leave a little kindness behind in someone’s life.
And perhaps the other person never realizes how much one small thing they said or did meant to us.
For me, kindness is perhaps about making someone’s life a little better, a little safer, or a little stronger—even when they do not understand at that moment what we are trying to do for them.
Because kindness does not always need gentle words.
Sometimes love comes in the voice of a scolding.
Sometimes care hides behind strictness.
And sometimes a few words from someone stay with us for so long that they become the very thing that helps us through our difficult moments.
Maybe that is the most beautiful thing about kindness:
It does not always announce itself.