Try a Little Tenderness

 Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a harder battle.
~ Plato

A “harder” battle? OOF! This ain't no contest babies. Whether it's more or less than you or me, it’s a stone truth that everyone is struggling.

Back in my customer service days, I found that, when faced with an angry, impatient and just generally nasty piece of work, killing with kindness often turned the sitch around and diffused the rage. Maybe not instantaneously but it happened. 

When it didn’t? I still won. Dude/Dudette may well be King/Queen Asshole BUT at least I’m not him/her!

Three things in human life are important: the first is to be kind; the second is to be kind; and the third is to be kind.
~ Henry James

Tell it Hank!

Do your little bit of good where you are; it's those little bits of good put together that overwhelm the world.
~ Desmond Tutu

and now THIS is in my head; Why? Because EVERYTHING is a song cue, that’s why.

Desmond has a barrow in the market place,
 
Molly is the singer in a band.
 
Desmond says to Molly, "Girl, I like your face,"

And Molly says this as she takes him by the hand: 

Obladi, Oblada, life goes on, bra,

Lala how their life goes on.

Obladi, Oblada, life goes on, bra,

Lala how their life goes on

I hope you will have a wonderful year, that you'll dream dangerously and outrageously, that you'll make something that didn't exist before you made it, that you will be loved and that you will be liked, and that you will have people to love and to like in return. And, most importantly (because I think there should be more kindness and more wisdom in the world right now), that you will, when you need to be, be wise, and that you will always be kind.
~ Neil Gaiman 

Me and Jim Dine's hearts in Montreall

My religion is very simple. My religion is kindness.
~ Dalai Lama XIV

That’s just beautiful and it's a filthy, disgusting crime against all life that evangelicals and their leaders don’t feel the same way. Oh, I'm sure they think they do BUT they've got mega caveats. Kindness, for them, is apparently NOT required IF the person is brown or black, an immigrant, poor, gay or otherwise different from themselves.

All I'm saying is, kindness don't have no boundaries.
~ Kathryn Stockett, The Help

One of our new neighbors, did the sweetest thing. He, outta nowhere, gave Ten a little bud. Weed ain’t cheap, mes amis. I guess they’d said hello, no more, while out on our porches smoking cigs. Maybe new-neighbor-guy recognized a fellow traveler in Ten or maybe he's just wonderfully kind. 

Guard well within yourself that treasure, kindness. Know how to give without hesitation, how to lose without regret, how to acquire without meanness.
~ George Sand

In this age of rabid Republi/Fascist greedheads and their insane “chosen one,” it is imperative that we keep our heads and NOT become like them. It’s all too easy for me to hate the vile, sick monstrosities who are toting our country to Hades in a cheap-ass hand basket. It’s easy to despise the craven, bullying dimwits who voted these depraved fuckers in.

But why waste my precious personal energy?

But remember, boy, that a kind act can sometimes be as powerful as a sword.
~ Rick Riordan, The Battle of the Labyrinth 

Try a Little Tenderness – Otis Redding