A CULTURE OF KINDNESS
The United Way hopes its new initiative will strengthen the Peninsula’s social fabric
In a world where you can be anything ,be kind.
It’s a motto the United Way of the Virginia Peninsula wants residents across the region to remember.
Acts of kindness, after all, are the backbone of a new initiative launched by the nonprofit organization. It is one that challenges people to be kind at work, at home and in their neighborhoods.
The United Way is encouraging communities to perform random acts of kindness throughout the week. The timing is apropos considering today is recognized as World Kindness Day.
The United Way’s initiative begins first as a weeklong challenge, but organizers hope those acts of kindness will sow seeds that become second nature in the weeks and months to come.
Virginia Peninsula schools have agreed to hold School Kindness Week from Nov. 12-16 in which students are participating in kindness-themed activities. For example, students at Poquoson City Public Schools will write essays about kindness and letters to people living in local nursing homes, among other activities.
Several localities have signed proclamations identifying themselves as Communities of Kindness.
Businesses are participating by donating funds to people in need throughout the community.
For a list of those businesses, visit uwvp.org/ kindness-challenge.
The Daily Press is also participating in this kindness initiative.
We want to hear about the acts of kindness you encounter each day. You can submit those by emailing them to letters@dailypress.com. We plan to publish those entries periodically for the foreseeable future.
Unsure what an act of kindness looks like? Consider donating your time or money to a local nonprofit organization, pick up litter along your neighborhood street or buy a coffee for the person behind you in line.
The opportunities are endless, they don’t need to be limited to just this week and they do not need to be a part of an organized effort.
Hold a door for the person behind you, make space for a driver merging into traffic or take a moment to chat with a neighbor.
The United Way hopes this campaign will build social capital that strengthens our region’s resolve and makes it a better place to live.
Imagine living in a region known across the country as one that is full of kind people? It’s one more feather in the Peninsula’s cap that may entice businesses to move into the region, families to resettle here and for young graduates to stay here.
Kindness also reduces loneliness and social isolation (think about those letters to nursing home residents), and it can be a cost-free way of reaching out to others to let them know they matter.
Consider raking your elderly neighbor’s leaves or delivering their mail to the door. That simple act will ease their burden during these colder autumn days.
This call to kindness has nothing to do with a politically correct culture that pervades our society. There is a difference between feeling obligated to act on the sensitivities of individuals and simply being a decent person.
President Franklin D. Roosevelt once said: “Human kindness has never weakened the stamina or softened the fiber of a free people. A nation does not have to be cruel to be tough.”
Flashing a friendly smile to a passer-by or waving to a neighbor from across the street is a long leap from wading into the depths of a politically correct culture.
It’s those small acts that ultimately build the social capital that glues us all together.
Visit uwvp.org/get-involved to learn more about the United Way’s Kindness Project.
And again, email acts of kindness you encounter to letters@dailypress.com.
Let us know the basic details about the people involved, where it took place and when. Consider including how it felt to be the initiator or recipient of that act of kindness.
We plan on publishing those acts periodically both in the print version of the paper and online at dailypress.com.
As far as we’re concerned, no good deed should go unpublished.