For months, I have been sitting with groups of people as we explore the impact of trauma on all of us. We have been guided by Resmaa’s book on trauma as we have attempted to come to grips with the unfortunate impacts of the trauma experienced by our ancestors or ourselves.
In talking so intently with others about this inherited trauma, I have forgotten about something equally important. I have not remembered equally well that I am the beneficiary of countless acts of kindness, not just acts of trauma.
So many acts of kindness have shaped me. These are not just the acts of kindness I have directly experienced, but also the vast number of acts of kindness that have preceded me and had such a great effect on me. I may have a dark side to my inheritance, but I also have a bright side as well.
I think of the thousands of gestures that have both saved and enriched lives, and I received that bounteous inheritance from the first moment of my existence. I am remembering the countless acts of kindness that have created a high functioning species like me. Every morning, I immerse myself in the memory of the acts of love that have shaped the kind of person I am today.
I know that I carry the burden of past trauma, my own and my ancestors. I also carry all the acts of kindness of those who have come before me. I carry in me all the warmth and support of the sea of kindness of those who surround me with an abundance of compassionate love.
The raw hostility of the world is softened by the generous kindness that I see as the prevailing face of a universe that is essentially benevolent and kind. I have been marked by countless acts of kindness of humans just like me.
I aspire to play my own role in shaping with kindness what is yet to come. My every act of kindness reaches out beyond the time I still have to be alive.