I love Valentine’s Day and the thought of life being about love and doing special things for the ones we love. To be fair, I also just really love chocolate.
With a young daughter, I try to be mindful of how to keep this special time of year about love for other people and what that really means instead of just an emphasis on romantic love. Romantic love is wonderful, but showing love and kindness towards people we may not know, while expecting nothing in return, is such a powerful thing. I love volunteering in Dallas with her, but there are even more ways we can spread love in the world to others with random acts of kindness. It is even better that Random Acts of Kindness Day follows Valentine’s Day on February 17!
I like to explain to my daughter that doing something kind instantly makes the world a better place to live and can change someone’s day – like having a super power! And just like most super heroes, our power may go unnoticed at first by others, making changes we can’t see but feel. Super heroes rarely are recognized for their good deeds, and that’s why random acts of kindness are best when done without expectation of recognition or even anonymously. We can do special things without telling anyone, sneaking off and keeping the good feelings we just made a special secret with ourselves.
Once it clicked how much being a randomly kind person is like being a superhero, we started using our secret super power of kindness all of the time! We may wear our super hero cape at home to clear the table or write a thank you note. Outside of the house we may not wear a cape, but we can still tap our super hero powers to help a friend or someone new.
You can get your little one interested in tapping his or her kindness super power with this printable list of some ideas for kid-appropriate random acts of kindness:
Encourage your child to try a new way to be kind, and it can be something he or she wants to try every day!
How do you talk to your children about being good citizens and kind to others?
So sweet!!