Normally February is dedicated to the love of others as is evidenced by special days like Valentine’s Day and Galentine’s Day. Last year on the blog we turned the focus to self-love because, let’s be honest, we all could stand to love up on ourselves a good bit more than we do (in our actions and in our words to ourselves). But this year, we are shifting our February focus yet again, this time moving away from love in its fullest sense and turning instead to the concept of kindness.

By definition according to Oxford Languages, kindness is the quality of being friendly, generous, and considerate. Kindness can be expressed as words or actions, and when in the form of the latter we refer to them as acts of kindness. National Random Acts of Kindness Day is actually on February 17th, another good reason to celebrate kindness on the blog this month.

My religion is very simple. My religion is kindness. – The Dalai Lama XIV

I came across this quote many years ago by happenstance. I was a yoga teacher and studio owner at the time and as such really focused on how to live more of a “yogic lifestyle”. Every yogi defines the yogic way of living differently, and I was working on trying to figure out what it meant for me when I saw this quote.

I have always endeavored to be a kind person. I learned “what goes around comes around” when I was growing up so being kind to others made good sense to me, but I never thought of it in terms of a religion. I considered myself religious at that time, and for years quite active in local churches and youth ministry programs, but the idea of kindness being someone’s religion really caught my attention.

When you break down the basic meaning of the word religion (lower case r religion, not upper case r Religion), it refers to a system of faith and/or a pursuit/interest to which someone ascribes supreme importance. And when I look at the quote again with this more basic definition in mind, it makes total sense. And after years of growing my yoga practice and my personal spiritual practices, I now wholeheartedly echo the Dalai Lama’s sentiment – My religion is very simple. My religion is kindness.

As we move into this second month of 2025, may you also embrace a perpetual sharing of kindness to yourself and others this month and beyond. Namaste.