Six years ago, my life looked very different. I was running a thriving garden design and landscaping company — from the outside, everything seemed successful. But my wife saw what I couldn’t: the constant stress, the bad moods, and the inability to switch off. I was racing through life, oblivious, as if running on a subconscious program… or maybe running from myself.
One Friday morning, as I rushed out the door — chest tight, coughing, and exhausted — my wife stopped me. She sat me down and asked: “If I sold all your machines, what would you do?” Without hesitation I said, “I think I could fly.”
And in that moment, years of bottled-up emotion poured out. I cried like I never had before. I had always believed tears were weakness, but that morning they became my first step toward kindness — and it had to start with being kind to myself.
Back then, I thought kindness was “soft,” even unmanly — something girly that didn’t belong in my world. At 6’7”, an ex-rugby player, I was afraid it would somehow take away my edge. But the truth was the opposite. When I returned to the rugby field in my mid-forties for a St. Stephen’s Day match, I played harder, smarter, and with more presence than ever before. I even broke through three tackles and scored a great try — not because I was tougher, but because I was balanced, focused, and unafraid.
Kindness had changed me.
It showed me that strength and gentleness are not opposites, but partners. That life is not about racing ahead, but slowing down enough to notice the beauty around us. That kindness isn’t grand gestures, but simple, everyday choices: leaving money for the next coffee at the cafe, holding the door open, offering a guiding hand, or writing a thank-you letter to my parents for all they had given me but I’d never said. When my mother phoned me in tears after reading that letter, I knew I had touched something that words alone couldn’t.
That’s why the Gentle Giant in my book Erica’s Light: A Journey of Kindness is based on my own path. His story is mine: the realization that kindness is not weakness, but the greatest strength of all.
There is no better feeling than showing kindness to another. They receive it, yes — but you do too. Kindness is the key to a better future. The choice is ours: to take part in the story, to play our role in the great movie of life.
Today, kindness isn’t just a word to me. It’s a way of living, woven into everything I do.
