Meeting Anger with Kindness

Here's another great story to show just another reason to share kindness. This came in my email last week and wanted to share it with you. Author unknown.

From 1993 through 1998 I was a vendor for Chevrolet dealerships. Each week I would take a look at their used cars that were for sale. I would fix cracks in leather, cigarette burns in fabric, re-color carpets that had stains, repair windshields that had been hit by a rock, etc.

Every week I would walk into this specific Chevrolet dealer's used car lot to see what the used cars needed in the way of repairs. The general manager's wife was named Cindy. Cindy was always very rude, treating me like I was below her or that she was better than me. I was always upbeat, positive and kind, but that never seemed to work with her.

One day she accused me of charging her to dye the carpet in a mini-van that had a stain in the carpet. She had driven the van for the weekend and said the stain was not there. Just trying to continually be aggressive, and negative without cause, she accused me in front of all her peers that day, and because I have always been an honest person who I finally took offense.

However, instead of being angry at being looked upon as someone that was not honest or had no integrity, I went to a florist and bought almost $100.00 in red roses with angels breath and had them put in this nice basket. I picked out a card, and stated that I was sorry for the misunderstanding and that I did not ever have the intention of making her angry.

The following week, I walked into her office like I did every week with my list of used cars that needed some attention before they were sold and said, "Hi Cindy," with my usual happy and up beat attitude. She gave me this big smile and said, "You bought me flowers." Every week thereafter she would always make a point to say, "Hey Mike, how ya doin?" or "Nice to see you, how are you?"

This woman began to change, perhaps because of this small act of kindness. It was actually so nice to see Cindy's whole way of being - change with me. She was always very kind, and would always have a big smile when I walked into her office.

I guess people can change with a little bit of kindness!