I help because I can (afford it). But would I help otherwise? This question makes me think about who I am. It might be a trivial thought, but I could never understand and express it clearly up to now:
Most of the times we perceive any helping hand as a true blessing, especially when it comes unasked or during tough times, when we need it most. But I believe that an important distinction needs to be made here: A helping act can only be called genuinely kind, when it involves some kind of effort or sacrifice from the helper*. In my opinion (although I might be wrong), genuine kindness has got nothing to do with friendship or love, but with a certain character type. This means that friends, even though they love us, might never be able to help genuinely kind. But there might well be strangers who would: A genuinely kind helping hand might come from anywhere and even from people we expect it least from.
I will always be thankful for any help, but from now on, I will definetely notice and cherish the genuinely kind helping hands most. The ones that come from people who help despite the fact that they cannot afford it. Even though it's not convenient for them.
*Genuine kindness might be in danger of extinction (if we think of it from an evolutionary perspective, genuine kindness, as I have defined it, is absurd).
2 comments:
I think I know some genuinely kind people, you are one of them.
:-D
But it is an extremely rare species (at least in our culture), f**k evolution ;-)
Very good post!
wow, that is very nice of you! hah, i wish i was!!
actually, it does not matter to the one being helped. help is help and it's a blessing any way you see it. it's priceless. any kind of help.
but it matters to the helper. this post is hopefully a little bit like acknowledging these people and giving them more credit.
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