In today's rollercoaster world, little kindness goes a long way

We can allow ourselves to be safe spaces for the strangers we meet on the street and those we know alike. [iStockphoto]

There is a photograph of Nigerian billionaire, bowed down in prayer, that has been doing the rounds. Someone asked what he could possibly be praying for. I mean, he has it all, doesn't he? The thing is, every single person has something that is not going their way. It is the curse of being human. It spares no one.

We have become very good at looking at people's lives from the outside and deciding that they have nothing to worry about. The well-dressed professional. The successful entrepreneur. The popular politician. The mother who seems to have everything under control.

Public records highlight that we lose at least four people every day to suicide in Kenya. Globally, more than 720,000 people die by suicide every year. The tragedy about suicide is that it cannot attributed to one cause. It is often the result of a combination of factors.

Recently, a young lady was found a month after she died. Whether she chose that path or something terrible happened to her, we may never know. For an entire month, life continued around her oblivious of the fact that she was no longer here.

There is just so much grief trying to imagine what her final days looked like. It is frightening to imagine how invisible a person’s struggles can become, how someone can be surrounded by people and still experience such profound loneliness. Sadly, that is the reality for so many people today.

In our pursuit for the perfect life, the most profitable business, the outstanding career, we have forgotten the core of our existence which is genuine relationships.

We fight to build transactional relationships while ignoring the ones that truly count. We are constantly told to reach upwards; to seek friendship with people ahead of us, those who can help us get where we want to go but we forget the people standing beside us.

Outside of home, the workplace happens to be where many people spend a significant part of their lives. It can therefore easily become either a place of support or yet another battlefront, depending on the culture there.

In a world ruled by ‘results’, sometimes we forget to ensure the wellbeing of those expected to deliver them. Employees, too, will do anything to get ahead forgetting that the underhand tactics, the sabotage and the senseless competition are pointless at the end of the day.

Society needs to stop and breathe for a minute. It must feel great to sit at the top. But these wins mean very little if getting there requires you to compromise your wellbeing or even worse, the wellbeing of the people around you.

We keep validating what is clearly wrong in the name of "such is life." But is it?

Does it make us lesser beings if we offer help more than we take? Does it diminish us when we let some things slide instead of taking offence at every single thing? Are we so set in our ways that if it isn't our way then it is the highway?

Does it erase us when we consider others before making decisions that will affect them? Does it, in any way, make us invisible when we choose empathy and grace more often than vindictiveness and scheming?

Life will be a lot easier when we acknowledge that every single person, even those we consider well put together, may be having it a little rough on some days. That driver, the MD, the waiter, your co-worker, all of them have to clock in regardless of what they are dealing with.

We can allow ourselves to be safe spaces for the strangers we meet on the street and those we know alike. Sometimes it is something as basic as a greeting that will make someone feel seen. Other times it may be lending a hand. Sometimes it is being the bigger person.

We are losing far too many people, we are watching families unravel because we are so obsessed with doing life, we fail to notice those faltering along the road. We do not need to be therapists. We simply need to be human. A little kindness really does go a long way.