Monday, October 10, 2022

An encounter, a book, and a surprising coincidence

When I joined a group at a table in the Café, I noticed that Genies was wearing a T-shirt that said, "Kind people are my kind of people."  Genies is my kind of people!  And this is a perfect segue into what I'm reading now on my Kindle.

The Power of Kindness: The Unexpected Benefits of Leading a Compassionate Life ~ by Piero Ferrucci, 2016 (10th anniv. edition), nonfiction, 352 pages

This book challenges us with the promise that generosity and decency are the secret to a fuller, more satisfying life.  Kindness is the key to our own happiness.  Ferrucci has added a chapter on harmlessness to chapters on virtues such as mindfulness, empathy, gratitude, generosity, and joy — plus new techniques, meditations, and exercises.

Now comes the curious happenstance:  I typed up this blog post and set it to post just after midnight.  I read both fiction and nonfiction, sometimes alternating back and forth.  After writing about nonfiction, I was in the mood to get back to my novel while things were still fresh on my mind, so I picked up the mystery I'd been reading on Donna's Kindle:  The Consequences of Fear (Book 16 of the Maisie Dobbs mysteries).  Almost immediately I came across this sentence:  "If I look back, Maisie, I think kindness is the most important thing" (p. 56).  Kindness, again!  What are the odds?

Word of the Day

hap·pen·stance / noun (North American) = coincidence.  Example:  "It was just happenstance that I was at that point in reading the book."

1 comment:

Helen's Book Blog said...

It's amazing how kindness is something we have to write about and convince people to be. What a sad commentary on society. It's so easy to be kind and feels so much better.