10 Ways to Be Kind to Yourself:
- Create a gratitude journal
- Take a hot shower or bath
- Learn something new
- Take time to go through a guided meditation
- Try some yoga or other kind of exercise
- Make something (knitting, painting, drawing, woodworking, etc.)
- Read a book
- Cook or bake
- Take a nap
- Eat breakfast, then pick up your phone
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10 Ways to Be Kind:
- Surprise someone with a phone call or a letter
- Make a positive comment on social media
- Do a random act of kindness
- Compliment someone
- Be mindful in how you treat others
- Think before you speak
- Help a family member/roommate with their chores
- Cook a meal for someone
- Tell someone you believe in them
- Show empathy to others
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Ways to Be Kind when Having Difficult Conversations:
Right now is the perfect time to start the conversation about drugs and alcohol with your family, but we know that this can be a hard and scary subject to approach. Let us help you! Here are some resources that will help you have an open and loving conversation about this difficult topic.
- Family Agreement Form: Avoiding Alcohol
- How to talk to kids about drugs: Age breakdown (Preschool – College)
- Extra Resources for talking with kids
Mental Health Benefits of Being Kind:
- Increased positivity in community: Acts of kindness have the potential to make the world a happier place. An act of kindness can improve confidence, control, happiness and optimism. It can also encourage others to repeat the good deed that they’ve experienced themselves, contributing to a more positive community!
- Helping others feels good: When you help others, it promotes positive physiological changes in the brain associated with happiness. These rushes are often followed by longer periods of calm and can eventually lead to better wellbeing.
- Reduced depression: Stephen Post of Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine found that when we give of ourselves, everything from life satisfaction to self-realization and physical health is significantly improved. Mortality is delayed, depression is reduced and well-being and good fortune are increased. Randomactsofkindness.org
- Less stress: Kind people have 23% less cortisol (the stress hormone) and age slower than the average population! Randomactsofkindness.org
- Increased happiness: A 2010 Harvard Business School survey of happiness in 136 countries found that people who are altruistic—in this case, people who were generous financially, such as with charitable donations—were happiest overall. Randomactsofkindness.org
- Less anxiety: A group of highly anxious individuals performed at least six acts of kindness a week. After one month, there was a significant increase in positive moods, relationship satisfaction and a decrease in social avoidance in socially anxious individuals. Randomactsofkindness.org
- Rewires the brain: Happiness researcher Sean Achor demonstrated through his extensive research that if you perform random acts of kindness for two minutes a day for twenty-one days, you can actually retrain your brain to be more positive.
- Improved sobriety-A 2004 Brown University study, for example, found that alcoholics who help other alcoholics have a 40% sober rate the next year, compared to 22% among alcoholics who didn’t help others.
- Improved performance: There’s some evidence that kind people actually perform better. A 1973 study found that teens who tutor 4th and 5th graders improve in their math, reading, and sentence completion skills. Improved performance can help people feel confident and happy!
- Decrease negative feelings: Negative emotions such as anger, aggression or hostility have a negative impact on our mind and body. Engaging in random acts of kindness can help decrease these feelings and stabilize our overall health.
Created by Mackenzie Brooks, Project Coordinator at Arbor Place Inc.