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We live in a culture that still treats kindness as a personality trait rather than a skill. Worse, it's often dismissed as a liability - something you grow out of, toughen past, or learn to suppress if you want to survive in "the real world". But anyone who has ever led a team through crisis, navigated a complex workplace, or held a community together through uncertainty knows the truth: kindness is not weakness. It is one of the most underrated forms of power we have.

And right now, that truth feels more urgent than ever.

We are living through a moment where public discourse is dominated by aggression, absolutism, and escalating threats. Headlines are filled with leaders using increasingly forceful language, including the current US President's recent statements about Iran, which have been widely reported as particularly vehement and confrontational. At the same time, conflicts around the world continue to inflict devastating harm on civilians. Images of bombed neighbourhoods, grieving families, and displaced communities circulate daily. The cruelty of war is no longer something distant or abstract - it is visible, immediate, and relentless.

In a climate like this, kindness can feel almost nave. But it is precisely in times of heightened hostility that kindness becomes a form of strength.

Firstly, let's clear something up: kindness is not the same as being "nice." Niceness is performative. It smooths edges, avoids conflict, and keeps the peace at any cost. Niceness is about comfort - often someone else's.

Kindness, by contrast, is active. It requires clarity, boundaries, and courage. It asks you to see people as they are, not as you wish they were. It demands that you show up with integrity even when it's inconvenient, unglamorous, or goes unnoticed. There is nothing weak about that.

In fact, kindness is often the hardest choice in the room.

It is far easier to be cynical. Cynicism costs nothing. It requires no vulnerability, no imagination, no willingness to be wrong. It lets you sit on the sidelines and critique the world without ever contributing to it. And in a global environment where outrage is rewarded with attention, cynicism can even feel like the default setting.

Kindness, on the other hand, is an investment. It takes energy. It takes intention. It takes the discipline to respond rather than react. And it takes the maturity to recognise that strength is not measured by how loudly you dominate a space, but by how responsibly you move through it.

We underestimate kindness because we confuse it with softness. But kindness is not soft. It is steady. It is the person who keeps their voice calm when everyone else is spiralling. It is the colleague who gives credit away instead of hoarding it. It is the leader who tells the truth without cruelty. It is the friend who holds you........

© Canberra Times