A man’s holiday experiment tracking acts of kindness reveals how humans naturally help each other – and how empathy grows stronger with practice, just like a muscle.
The story
During the holidays, Ronan started keeping track of kind acts he saw on a little chalkboard by his door. At first, he wrote down the usual stuff – people dropping off food at shelters, strangers helping after storms, neighbors sharing supplies. But it got him thinking bigger about how humans actually do pretty amazing things for each other all the time.
While volunteering at a local shelter, he saw firsthand how many people show up just to help out. Not for attention or rewards – they just wanted to make someone else’s day better. It reminded him of all the disaster relief stories where communities come together to rebuild.
Reading “A Practical Empath: Rewire Your Mind” by Scott Howard Swain helped Ronan understand why we’re wired to care about each other. The book showed him that empathy is like any other skill – the more you practice, the stronger it gets.
By New Year’s, that chalkboard was packed with examples of everyday kindness. Sure, some were big gestures like major donations, but most were simple things – sharing umbrellas in the rain, helping carry groceries, checking on elderly neighbors during storms.
Ronan realized something cool: being good to each other isn’t rare or special. It’s just what humans naturally do when we tap into our empathy. His chalkboard became a reminder that we all have the power to make life better for someone else, even in tiny ways.
