“A sign of character is consistently choosing to be kinder than necessary.” ~ Adam Grant

We are going to turn this quote on it’s head! I don’t believe it is as straight forward as it may seem, or it is, and we are simply going to dig deeper. 

You may be reading this and thinking, “I am kinder than necessary—most of the time,” and to that I say, “Good for you! That’s awesome.” You might be thinking, ‘I’m kind to store clerks, I’m kind to the cleaning staff in my building, I’m kind to strangers. Yup, I’m kinder than is necessary.’ But are you kinder than necessary to those people in your life that are challenging, frustrating, and maybe even annoying? That’s what I thought. Me, too.

You’ve heard me say it before, “It’s easy to love the lovable.” We don’t really get a gold star for that, it’s too easy. We get the gold star for character when we are kinder than necessary to those prickly people in our life—the ones that are challenging, frustrating, and maybe even annoying. So, if you started to pat yourself on the back, like I did as I read Adam Grant’s quote, take a little step back. Look around you and figure out who’s the prickly one, and then go be kind to him or her! Now that’s character.

Let’s GO! WE GOT THIS!
Beth