Tag: kindness

By Posted on Posted in Activism, Democracy, Diversity, General Commentary, Gratitude, Mindset, People Helping People, Psychology, Social and Economic Justice, Talking to the Other Side Tagged with , ,

Guest post by Robert Middleton (reprinted, with permission, from his August 19, 2025 newsletter):

Does the world feel upside down right now?

With news filled with images of the National Guard in D.C. and families separated by immigration crackdowns, you may wonder:

What difference could I possibly make?

The air is heavy with uncertainty.

Fear, anger, and confusion ripple through conversations, social feeds, and daily headlines.

In such times, the smallest acts of courage, kindness, and responsibility matter more than ever.

When history seems to be surging around us, it’s easy to dismiss the impact of day-to-day choices.

Keeping our heads down and worrying that things will get worse can make us feel powerless.

But what if you did something different? What if you chose to make a difference every day?

Instead of complaining, worrying, blaming, or lashing out, try this:

• Check in on a friend going through a rough patch. Let them know that you care and that you’re there for them.
• Support a local business owned by new Americans, as an act of solidarity, not charity.
• Contribute to a political advocacy group that’s supporting a cause you feel strongly about.
• Write a short note of gratitude to a teacher or healthcare worker who is coping with stress.

None of these actions will stop the world from spinning faster than we can keep up.

But each is a reframing—a choice to build up, not tear down, hope and connection.

During times marked by images of a nation’s capital occupied by military forces, or ordinary people rounded up and searched, public trust breaks down.

A collective sense of helplessness—and sometimes rage—sets in.

But when the macro feels out of reach, the micro is where we reclaim our agency.

• Kindness to a neighbor reminds both of you that not all relationships are defined by politics or fear.
• Speaking up—even quietly—for someone treated unjustly counters the narrative that cruelty is normal, or that no one cares.
• Choosing curiosity over numbness or judgment plants seeds of resilience and community.

These actions rarely make headlines.

Yet, like steady water wearing down stone, they have the power to shift neighborhoods, workplaces, and even families quietly back toward sanity and care.

You don’t need a five-step plan to save democracy, or an answer to every injustice.

What you do have—every day—is the opportunity to gently resist cynicism, isolation, and fear.

Sometimes, the strongest stand isn’t a shouted slogan or a march, but a persistent, small act of care that refuses to let the cruelty of the moment make us less human.

In these turbulent times, being someone who still tries—not perfectly, not heroically, but persistently, in your own way—is no small thing.

History may remember the leaders and the laws, but the future will be shaped by the quiet, daily choices that keep dignity and compassion alive.

And that difference, however humble, is always worth making.

If you can relate to this struggle to make a difference in turbulent times, I invite you to check out the M.A.D. Team website with a simple approach to making a difference. Take what you can and give a shot at putting the ideas into action.

Then, twice a month, join us on Zoom to share ideas for making a difference. The first date is Friday, September 5, at 12 noon Pacific (1MT/2CT/3ET). You can make your reservation now if you like!

Cheers, Robert

If you like this newsletter, please feel free to forward it to a friend.
They can subscribe here: https://ordinaryvisionaries.com/mad

Quote of the Day:

“The greatest danger in times of turbulence is not the turbulence; it is to act with yesterday’s logic.”
– Peter Drucker

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By Posted on Posted in Activism, Environment, People Helping People, Psychology, Shel's Personal Life, Social and Economic Justice Tagged with , , , ,
My friend Kathleen Gage posted a quote from Albert Schweitzer about people sometimes reacting with hostility or obstruction to your attempts to improve the world. And then she said.

So if you are doing good for praise and accolades, you are doing it for the wrong reasons and it is no longer a good deed. It is an act of manipulation.
Do good because you are called to do good and for no other reason.

I’m going to gently disagree. I agree with the first two statements. But I disagree about “for no other reason.” I’m guessing that really what we have is different definitions of the concept of a calling—that mine is a lot stricter than hers. And that’s because, a few times in my life, I’ve experienced a genuine calling: a feeling that I was put into this place at this time to do something very specific—and that I had to do it.

We do good for lots of other reasons than because we are called to: to show your children what is possible. To make conditions better for others. To improve the lot of a group facing oppression that you don’t belong to–or that you do. To right an immediate wrong. Not all of these rise to the level of a calling. But all of them (and far too many more to list). I became an activist at age 12 and remain one. Five times, I have felt that calling—to:

1. Do what I could to stop the Vietnam war
2. Move the country away from a reliance on nuclear power (maybe the worst technology ever invented)
3. Protest publicly when the US bombed Libya (and I was the *only* protester on the first day, but by a few days later, there was a whole group of us out in front of the courthouse)

4. Save the mountain two miles from my house (with a massive outpouring of community support, won that one in just 13 months!)

View of the Mount Holyoke Range, showing the land saved by Save the Mountain in 2000.
View of the Mount Holyoke Range, showing the land saved by Save the Mountain in 2000.

5. My current mission of showing the business community how to turn hunger and poverty into sufficiency, war into peace, and catastrophic climate change into planetary balance—not through guilt and shame, but through enlightened self-interest
Yet these are only the tiniest fraction of thousands of actions I’ve taken for social change. The rest were not a “calling” but simply the right thing to do. They were not done for self-aggrandizement. If that had been my goal, I would have taken far faster and easier paths (like the Internet millionaire meme). Some of them were tiny and easy, like signing a petition. Others consumed years of my life, like the time I spent building what we now think of as the LGBTQ movement or my involvement in changing the politics of the city I lived in for 17 years, and the small town where I’ve lived for the past 18. Most were somewhere between, like serving on committees for grassroots groups or local governments.
That said, I gleefully share that my current calling is the most exciting and meaningful work I’ve ever taken on.
When have you felt a calling? What was it for and what was the result?

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