Relying on the power of kindness is a sensitive undertaking. The challenge is to inspire people to be kind more often without tainting the selflessness that comes from doing something nice with no ulterior motive.
Interpretation
Kindness should be encouraged but must remain selfless and genuine.
In this quote, Daniel Lubetzky reflects on the delicate balance of promoting kindness in society. While it is essential to inspire people to be kind, doing so should not lead to actions that are driven by personal gain or ulterior motives. True kindness comes from a place of sincerity and selflessness, and any encouragement to be kind must preserve that purity.
In practice
In a speech about community engagement, one might reference this quote to emphasize the importance of selfless acts of kindness.
We need to understand the other side to impact the other side. We become much more effective as humans and leaders when we engage in hearty conversations with those who are different from us, not necessarily to change our opinions, but to build the empathy muscle.
Civilized discourse demands critical thinking, self-reflexiveness, sober-headed analysis.
The ideal is to build a culture of healthy discussion, where everyone's ideas are valued. At KIND, we want everyone to be comfortable challenging my or anyone else's ideas without ever feeling or making someone else feel that the questioning is a personal attack.
You have to be very careful. If you over-commercialize a social mission, it completely loses its soul.
My dad had this incredible kindness that oozed through every part of his body. He had the ability to look at life positively in spite of what he went through. He was a Holocaust survivor. When he was 15-1/2 years old, he was liberated from the Dachau Concentration Camp by American soldiers who risked a lot to save people they had never met.
To maintain our entrepreneurial spirit, we have to create a culture in which everyone remembers that every order, big or small - and every interaction, every moment - will define what our company is today and what it will become tomorrow.
When a man is getting better he understands more and more clearly the evil that is still left in him. When a man is getting worse he understands his own badness less and less.
O unfathomable depth! O Deity eternal! O deep ocean! What more could You give me than to give me Yourself?
Look closely at those who patronize you. Half are unfeeling, half untaught.
There are many ways up the mountain and each of us must choose a practice that feels true to our heart.
Hegel was right when he said that we learn from history that men never learn anything from history.
Good temper, like a sunny day, sheds a ray of brightness over everything; it is the sweetener of toil and the soother of disquietude!
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