Fighting Terror with Kindness

Subject: Fwd: Fighting Terror With Kindness

Coping With Tragedy
Fighting Terror With Kindness

By Shmuel Greenbaum
[email protected] <mailto:[email protected]>

Kindness
has been my personal response to terror. My wife, Shoshana, was
murdered by a suicide bomber. She was one of over 100 victims that were
killed or injured on August 9, 2001 at the Sbarro restaurant in
Jerusalem.

Sometimes I wonder whether telling my story can
really help others. Since, the way I am coping with tragedy is so
different than the norm, would anyone else understand it?

Many
of the rabbis that came to visit me told me a story about a carpet.
"Sometimes you only see the knots on the back," they said; "Only later
do you see the beautiful design on the front." I thanked them for
coming and explained that I see the beautiful design now. I see the
"big picture."

I have always been interested in the "big
picture" – in how to make the world better. Since I was a kid, I always
liked to tackle these big problems by assembling a group of experts to
solve them. As a teenager I designed a system to tap hydroelectric
power from the wastewater of apartment buildings. I contacted a local
engineering school and assembled a team of academicians to prepare the
plan for the US Department of Energy.

After my wife’s violent
murder, I began a project to teach people how to be kinder. The project
has just started to take off. At the moment, we have more than 30,000
subscribers on six continents to our "Daily Dose of Kindness" e-mail.
Everyone who signs up for this e-mail list is also automatically signed
up as an advisor. As I said before, I like having many advisors. Right
now, I have over 30,000 "Kindness advisors".

One of my
Kindness advisors sent me an e-mail link to an article in the New York
Times about how medical researches have found that acts of kindness
stimulate the brain in the same place that physical pleasures do. So
now medical researchers have shown that doing kindness causes
enjoyment. From this you can see one way that I cope with tragedy – I
receive tremendous pleasure by promoting kindness.

My favorite
author on kindness is Zelig Pliskin. In his book Kindness, he presents
eighty-five techniques to find new opportunities to do kindness by
improving yourself and improving the world around you. In one chapter
he explains how you can feel the thrill of an international sports
victory every day if you visualize 100,000 people applauding for you
and cheering you on when you do an act of kindness. Studies have shown
that our hormonal system has actual biochemical responses even though
the victory is totally a figment of our imagination.

Shortly
after my wife’s death, I prayed with great intensity to G-d to help me
to make the world better. From the feedback I am getting from my
kindness projects, it is clear that my prayers are being answered and
that I am helping to make the world a little kinder – one person at a
time. This feeling of Divine assistance combined with the biochemical
responses to my imagined victory has given me tremendous emotional
strength.

Join Us!
Be a "Partner In Kindness."
Visit our websites:

English:
http://www.TraditionOfKindness.org (Daily Jewish e-mail)
http://www.PartnersInKindness.org (Weekly Non-Sectarian e-mail)

French:
http://groups..yahoo.com/group/Potentiel_de_Bonte <http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Potentiel_de_Bonte>

<http://groups.yahoo.com/group/Potentiel_de_Bonte/> <http://groups.yahoo..com/group/Potentiel_de_Bonte/> (Weekly e-mail)

Spanish:
http://espanol.groups.yahoo.com/group/LapracticadelaBondad/ (Weekly e-mail)

Hebrew:
http://groups..yahoo.com/group/KindWordsInHebrew/ <http://groups.yahoo.com/group/KindWordsInHebrew/> (Weekly e-mail)

German:
http://de.groups.yahoo.com/group/FreundlicheWorte (Weekly e-mail)

Russian:
http://health.groups.yahoo.com/group/KindWordsInRussian/ (Weekly e-mail)

Indonesian:
http://asia.groups.yahoo.com/group/KataKataBaik/ (Weekly e-mail)

Portuguese:
http://br..groups.yahoo.com/group/ParceirosNaBondade/ <http://br.groups.yahoo.com/group/ParceirosNaBondade/> (Weekly e-mail)
If
you would like to do a very easy, but powerful act of kindness, forward
this e-mail to friends and relatives. If you know of any groups that
are interested in having me speak, I don't charge a fee, other than
travel from New York (if I am not already in the area).