Kindness

I've been thinking pretty much nonstop about kindness. Not your run-of-the-mill open the door kindness, but the kind of kindness that nearly sweeps you off of your feet, leaves you feeling like you've fallen on your back from the monkeybars, makes you look around the room to see who is smirking behind their hand. It's the kind of kindness that you wonder when the other shoe will drop because nobody you know believes that this sort of kindness can exist. It's grace and beauty and sadness and love all wrapped up in one big bundle that exists and moves forward; rolling, shimmying, pausing, picking its way forward gingerly and not always lucidly. Not that the smaller gestures of kindness aren't important...they are. But this is the kind of kindness that gets out of its own way. It is deeply, intentionally out of its own way. And not in your way either. It's the kind of kindness that holds space. There, I said it, it *holds space*. I never even knew what that really meant until I experienced this kind of kindness. It's that powerful.

All I have to say is that I just spent the weekend with a group of the kindest and most generous people I know. People who show up even though things are not clear, who are there for those they love, who are willing to be in the space of unknowing. People who do not make it about themselves. People who have their priorities straight by working with the needs of others. It's the most solemn gift.  It's amazing and breathtaking all at the same time.