Life can be shit.
Mine certainly has had its moments. Over the years, shit things have happened and been said to me many, many times.
And the most frequent perpetrator of these moments came from me – myself.
This is not meant to be a woe-is-me article. It’s not a founding story. It’s just a recognition that the kindness that I’m hoping to perpetuate through Best of Our KIND isn’t easy because of many factors… including, and most significantly, from ourselves getting in the way.
I purposefully started this article with what I tell my children is called a ‘swear’. It may be contradictory to the purpose of this ‘movement’ but I wanted to show that I’m a human… a sweary human at that and just because I swear doesn’t mean I’m not kind.
I’m trying to be kinder – to myself and to others. But it’s a practice that I’m not used to – well not to myself at least.
It was through this understanding that I need to be kinder to me to heal from all of the shit moments that I’ve experienced throughout my life (including those of my own doing or saying) that made me look more broadly at the world around me.
Well before this revelatory moment of clarity around self-kindness, I got sucked down many rabbit holes of political, socio-economic and artistic discourse. Although I never actively participated, I found myself following conversations and stories of division with an obsession that may not be considered healthy.
It seemed that on so many fronts humanity was looking to divide – drawing lines and fighting across a matrix of topics; politics, class, gender, sex, religion and race. The way we seemed to battle each other across these lines seemed progressively aggressive – anger and hatred or sarcastic and gleefully mocking each other.
At first I found this funny. The world was becoming a soap opera being played out on social media with the daily scripts written by The Media. I would sit and watch all of this damage and laugh… until I wanted to cry.
There’s a song by one of my favourite bands, Tool, called ‘Vicarious’ which talks about voyeuristically watching society breakdown and destroy itself. I realised this was me.
I started wondering about what this social self-destruction would mean for my children. I’ve always tried to parent with openness, kindness and joy and everything I was consuming was in direct conflict with what I was showing my kids how life was or should be.
They were young teenagers and at a time where they were shaping their adult selves, they lost their mother after three years of fighting a brain tumour. So, life handed them a big pile of shit at a critical time for their development.
I felt so sad about the impacts of the trauma they experienced – I myself lost someone I loved at their age. I felt sadness and guilt that I hadn’t been the best father that I could have been whilst their mother was ill.
That guilt weighed even heavier when I reflected on my own experiences with death at a young age. I had accepted that my children would likely need extra support after their mother passed and I felt I knew what to do after the fact rather than prioritising supporting them during the trauma.
What I failed to acknowledge was the need for me to heal properly first… and I faked my own management of trauma the way I had always done it. And without confronting it properly, without healing, I just focused on my failures, worries and concerns.
Stoicism was my biggest issue. All my life I’d told myself that if I project strength I’ll become strength. Death is a part of life and after the sadness of my first experience with it every other passing was treated as a sad thing I put in a box and locked away. I needed to pull up my socks and get back on with showing strength. That if I wasn’t there for those who needed me, I was failing as a partner, friend, family member, or parent.
Just after my wife passed away I discovered Ren – a fantastic artist who spoke about his struggles with self-doubt and criticism and this was a catalyst for me. There’s a line in the monologue following his song “Hi Ren” where he talks about being flexible and relaxing so the dance of being human becomes easier.
It inspired me to look at how I can be kinder to myself and learn to dance with more fluidity and ease. To not be so rigid about my side of all the lines that had been drawn to divide.
I started seeking help. I started working on myself. And I found someone special who recognised the need for the work and supports me through the process.
Carl Jung talks about the shadow self – the side of our personality that we don’t like to spend time with or exploring. The shadow is where my sadness, anger and guilt live and I’ve started exploring this part of me to understand how those feelings affect my actions and my words to myself. Ironically, Tool has many songs that are Jungian themed but it was only through trauma therapy that I learnt how to apply the principles of shadow exploration.
The changes I see within myself have positively affected the way I view and feel about myself, the way I talk to and love my kids and partner, and the way I see those who stand firmly on the opposite side of the lines that have been drawn.
I see myself as someone who has been shaped by the trauma I experienced at a young age and that I developed my shadow self to survive. The things I’ve done and said are not things I’m proud of but I understand the reasons for them.
I look at my kids and instead of yelling at them when they hide their rubbish down the back of the sofa or leave their socks lying around for the dog to mangle, I see them as people making choices (instinctively or deliberately) because of how they’ve been shaped by the significant trauma they’ve experienced.
I see trolls and content creators on social media as people who are angry, scared, or hyper-protective because they feel part of some community that is disadvantaged, exploited, or unfairly blamed for driving division and all they want is acceptance, justice, or recognition.
They’re no longer in opposition as such now… I see them as being shaped by their own fears, sadness, guilt and anger. That hasn’t made me accept their opinions or actions, but it has made me feel more compassionate about who they are as fellow humans on this planet.
This is why Best of Our KIND exists — not as a prescription, but as an extension of the work that I have done and a way to support others looking for the same outcomes as me.
By being kinder to myself, I can be more relaxed about my perceived failures… and by being kinder to others I can be more relaxed about our differences. All with the hope of a future where we are all dancing more fluidly and the world I have tried to teach my children about is the reality that they’ll live.