The power of being soft in a sharp, pointy world

Why choosing kindness in a hard, exhausting world isn’t weakness. It’s radical strength, and the key to living with purpose, resilience, and defiance.

Hi,

“Kindness is soft. And soft is weak.”

That’s the story we’ve been told since we were kids. If you want to survive in this world, you have to be tough. You have to cut before you get cut. You have to hustle harder, outwork everyone, and grind your bones into dust just to get noticed.

It’s exhausting.

I tried living that way, and it hollowed me out. It made me bitter, paranoid, and small. There’s nothing “strong” about being a spiky, hard thing surrounded by spiky, hard things.

In that world, real strength is being a balloon.

When everything around you is already hard and pointy, being soft is the most radical and powerful thing you can do.

And I don’t mean “nice.” Nice is passive. Nice is not rocking the boat. Nice is the smile you plaster on your face while you die a little inside.

I’m talking about seeing the pain coming toward you and opening yourself to it anyway, even if it pops you.

That’s militant kindness. Kindness that fights. Kindness that refuses to be ground down by a system t…