Be a little kinder

How kind are you? This question is quite easy to answer. We all know deep down how well we treat those around us. How much time we spend making other people’s lives better, happier, easier. But that was not the focus of the Kindness Workshop that Bidvest Insurance hosted last Friday for its women clients and partners. The focus of this Kindness Workshop was how kind are you to yourself?

The subject matter was fitting for National Women’s Month. Women are notoriously poor at being kind to themselves, rather spending far more of their kindness on their colleagues, friends, children and partners. So, when Jane Linley-Thomas, East Coast Radio DJ, and Paul Bushell, Psychologist, posed the very first question of the day which was: What did you think when you looked at yourself in the mirror this morning? It made the 35 women in the room realise the ingrained negativity that we impose on ourselves daily and purely out of bad habit.

Lucy Cooke, Jane Linley-Thomas & Paul Bushell

The rest of the morning was spent rewiring our brains to learn a new way. To stop the habit of self-negativity. We explored the power of positive affirmations, journaling, performing a deliberate act of kindness for ourselves or others, be that taking a long hot bath or bringing our colleagues a coffee. We were actually tasked with a 30-day kindness challenge! We each wrote down 30 acts of kindness and placed them into a cup, we swapped some with each other and now have one act of kindness to complete a day. The acts ranged from bungee jumping off Moses Mabhida stadium, to complimenting a stranger, to watching an hour of your favourite series. Many of the comments were around how the happier kinder ‘us’ interacts so much better with everyone we encounter and can perpetuate the kindness.

I left feeling energised, and reminded about how my perception of myself has such a profound impact on the two girls I am raising and how in turn they will learn to perceive themselves. This Dove campaign sums it up so beautifully and all mums should take the three minutes to watch it. Dove Legacy Video.

A massive thank you to the team at Bidvest Insurance for this unusual and wonderfully indulgent morning spent learning all about how to be kinder. To me!