November 10, 2016

A Note On Kindness

This is not a political website, so we’re not going to talk politics. We respect that the members of our community fall on all sides of the fence — that’s a huge reason why we love you so much. Regardless of how we feel about political issues, we all agree about the utmost importance of coming together for the children in our lives who need a safe place to live and grow, and for the birth mothers who have made the unbelievably selfless choice to place their child for adoption.

No matter how you voted on Tuesday, it’s clear that what this world needs right now is some kindness and compassion. For many of our children, this is the first election cycle they’re really cognizant of. Can you imagine that? It has been divisive in horrible ways, and parents especially have had to hit the ground running, explaining so many things to our children and handling big, huge, overwhelming questions about issues and levels of hatred that we often wish our little ones hadn’t been exposed to just yet.

Whether you are Democrat, Republican, Green Party, Libertarian, Muslim, a racial minority, a woman, LGBTQ, disabled, Jewish — ANYONE — you owe it to your children to teach them how to find and lead with kindness. It is devastating that we live in a world where people who have opposing viewpoints often don’t feel safe communicating with one another. It teaches us to live in bubbles, it teaches our children to live in bubbles, and it breeds hatred, confusion, and fear.

This is not how we want to see our youngest generation growing up in this world.

So this week, when your children have so many questions about what’s going on and how they’re supposed to process it all, talk to them about kindness. Talk to them about it what it means to hear someone else’s viewpoint, to agree to disagree, to give people the benefit of the doubt, to look beyond the external and to find the humanity inside, to champion the fact that we are all different, and that America, our country, has always represented freedom, courage, and bravery.

Your kids may be scared. They have a right to feel fear. But we have a responsibility to them to raise them up, give them hope, help them find love, and teach them to navigate this world with as much compassion and kindness as they can possibly muster.

No matter what side you’re on, hate will never be the answer. Find some love today.