Why Making a Difference is Good for Us (with 7 Tips to Make it Easy!)

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Do you find knowing all the terrible stuff that’s happening in the world a bit much? Whether it’s war, famine, abuse of power, damage to the environment, misconduct or neglect. The list goes on and on—and the news just keeps sharing more sad and depressing things with us every day.

Where do we find the resilience and strength to deal with it all? How do we stay engaged and not switch off? How do we hold onto our compassion?

Let’s get personal for a moment…

Each of us has personal beliefs and values we connect to, take support from and build on.

These come from our own experiences (our history) and lead us to feel strongly about one thing, but not another. Essentially, our past successes, hurts and disappointments (especially as we were growing up) lead us to form a view of what is right—and wrong—in the world.

And we can use these values, beliefs and experiences to help us make change.

Because all too often we think we are powerless to make a difference

But this is simply untrue. What you do is important. You matter. And you can and do make a difference.

If you think you’re too small to have an impact, try going to bed with a mosquito in the room. Anita Roddick

So a key part of the Fierce Kindness philosophy is choosing to do something about what we think is wrong in the world and take action—however small.

What’s happening in the world impacts how we feel

It’s hard to be content or happy when we see so much suffering and destruction, whether it’s in the Ukraine, Ethiopia, Afghanistan or more locally.

We look around and see our community, environment and the natural world declining due to human encroachment and corporate greed.

And we can all see a greater than ever divisiveness among our fellow humans—whether it’s class and income divides, race, gender, whom we love, our faith or who is vaccinated against COVID and who is not…

We know far more about what’s going on around the world than we did even 30 years ago. The ‘news’ is rarely positive, and it’s almost always something that is outside of our control.

We are told daily about all the terrible things happening around us which leads to us feel:

Angry, guilty, sad or depressed.
Frustrated, powerless and helpless to change things.
Hopeless and we give up trying…

The state of the world affects our well-being

How can it not? We are human beings.

At Fierce Kindness we believe that to be truly happy, we need to live a life of meaning.

A life of meaning isn’t about finding the perfect career, starting a charity or giving everything up to help others.We simply need to consciously* do something (meaningful to us!) to make our world a better place.

* Doing something consciously means you make a clear connection between what you do and the kind of world you want to live in.

This something doesn’t need to be big, time-consuming or expensive. The important thing is just to start. To do something. Anything.

Small is good here! Because over time, our contribution and actions usually grow. We learn more. Things become a habit. We find a deep connection with what matters and want to do more.

To be happy, we must take action!

We find meaning and purpose in life when we become part of the change we wish to see.

Specifically we need to:

Find something meaningful we can do—that makes a difference.
Consciously connect that meaningful thing you do to making the world a better place.

You must choose to do something (whether it’s your career, donating, volunteering etc.) and give yourself credit for doing it…

Plus, reclaiming our personal power helps us stay resilient

When the state of the world affects our well-being, doing something about it helps us feel stronger and better.

Together, we create a better world…

As we each contribute to the world we want to see, these actions become a habit or regular part of our life. Then it’s easy to add something else on. We begin to think bigger.

We feel happier because we are doing something about the things that bother us. We enjoy life more. And we also role model a new way of being—inspiring others.

Then gradually, as more and more people feel happier and do something, then do more, together we create the possibility of a shift in how our world works…

7 Essential Tips to Truly Enjoy Taking Action!

Get personal: To find meaning we must make it personal. What bothers you most about our world? What ideas do you already have? Notice which ideas grab you or seem most important.
Take it easy: Choose something easy to do. As small as you need to. Done is better than perfect. Something is better than nothing. Just get started!
Lose the Guilt. There are always going to be more things you could do and more ideas than it is physically possible to do. That’s why we say NO GUILT. Do what you can. Easily. Then go/grow from there.
No pressure! When you forget to do something, or get it wrong, just notice and try again in future.
Forgive yourself: It’s likely that as you learn and do, you’ll discover you’ve made mistakes and done things in the past that had a negative impact. But we are all learning. We are all imperfect. We all impact our planet—and the people around us. We simply want to minimise the negative and maximise the positive!
You are kind and brave: Doing something—anything—in this busy, distracted world takes courage, kindness and effort. So give yourself credit for taking action.
It’s not your responsibility to fix our society or the planet! Simply become part of the solution. REMEMBER that the burden of change does not fall solely on us as individuals.

Wrap-up

My own personal experiences have led me to value community and friendship, kindness, beauty, courage—and empowerment/taking action. I’m guessing you can see where Fierce Kindness comes from…

And in the next few articles (a series for Earth Day) we’re going to offer several ideas for things you can do for the planet, and ways you can begin to make a difference.

Here is the Earth Day Series to help you find ways to make a difference:

Earth Day Series 1: 8 Things You Can do to Shop More Kindly!
Earth Day Series 2: 19 Interesting Ideas to Speak up and Make a Difference!
Earth Day Series 3: Why Building Community Matters with 9 Fun Ideas to Get Started
Earth Day Series 4: 5 Easy Ways to Be Kind to Our Planet
Earth Day Series 5: Why Kindness to Yourself Matters…

And check out these gorgeous, ‘mystical’ themed Earth Day Quote Graphics to Share

Earth Day Quotes Affirmations on Gradient Background

Click to get these “Mystical” Earth Day Quote Graphics