Sharon Salzberg – The Kindness Handbook: A Practical Companion (Literature Review)

It is often said that kindness is a virtue. While that may be true, its practice is often neglected in the business of everyday life, as we rush from here to there, juggling a nine to five job while struggling to spend as much quality time as we can with loved ones. It can all become a bit much, can’t it? Remembering the simple things that come hand in hand with politeness and generosity, such as practicing kindness and loving others for their own unique rhythm?

Well, motivational speaker, blogger and New York Times best-selling author Sharon Salzberg’s The Kindness Handbook: A Practical Companion may just change that. While mindfulness is something of a new craze in terms of popularity, Salzberg has made a study of the concept for the past 40 years, working with a number of masters of the craft and even appearing on a panel alongside the Dalai Lama.

Through her work as a teacher of intensive awareness practice and the co-founder of the Insight Meditation Society and Barre Centre for Buddhist Studies in Massachusetts (which, incidentally, was the first major centre for mindfulness run and founded by westerners upon its opening in the 1970s), she has developed a series of podcasts and blog posts designed to improve people’s practice of kindness, as well as being a regular contributor to Huffington Post and editor at O Magazine. In 1999, she was recognised by the New York Open Centre for bringing mindfulness to western cultures and her TEDx Talk on YouTube (Transform Your Mind, Change Your World) has been viewed over 38,000 times.

Today, Salzberg is the author of various books and audio programmes on the subject of kindness and mindfulness in general including Loving-Kindness: The Revolutionary Art of Happiness, Loving-Kindness Meditation and Love Your Enemies (with Robert Thurman) along with a number of other “sub-genres”. This book, in particular, was first published in 2008 and re-printed again last year.

The Kindness Handbook offers a more back-to-basics approach, giving an overview and insight into the practice of kindness, for oneself as well as others. A reference guide of sorts, the book is divided into short sharp chapters with only one topic such as “Delighting in Goodness”, “Sympathetic Joy”, “Communication” and “Increasing Self-Compassion Through Reflection”, making it easy for the reader to dip in and out of the book, taking away and returning to certain sections as circumstances arise. There’s even the occasional exercise for the reader to complete (if they so choose) such as the inclusion of Dr Neff’s “Self-Compassion Scale”.

Given her background, it would be easy for Salzberg to become preachy with her personal beliefs, something I was a little worried about when I first began reading. In her TEDx talk, Salzberg states that there is no need to have any affiliation with religion in order to practice mindfulness, something which is further emphasised in The Kindness Handbook.

While there is a strong focus on the Buddhist techniques and practices Salzberg herself uses, with quotes from Buddha, books she has read and advice received from friends, there is enough space within her words to allow readers to take what they want from the book and leave what they don’t, to look beyond the spiritual front to the practical wisdom within. In this way, she writes with an authority gained from her years of teaching and meditative practice, but in a style that is not overwhelming or “pushy” like other handbooks or instruction manuals.

The accessibility of this book comes also in the fact that it’s so quotable, with Salzberg sharing short snippets of her wisdom in “takeaway” phrases like, “For kindness to be more fully realized, it needs to be distinguished from being ineffectual or meek. It also needs to be infused with wisdom, supported by courage, and threaded with balance.” (“Introduction”, p. 1) and “As life presents annoyances, disagreeable experiences and irritations, it can be a bold and creative challenge to meet these experiences with kindness and interest rather than a built-up stockpile of resentment”. (“Shifting Perspectives” p. 57). With this simple advice, Salzberg has managed to convey thoughts not only for readers to take with them into everyday life, but sum up her book as a whole. It is with this succinctness and “less is more” approach that, in my opinion, the book works so well.

At the end of the day, we all have our struggles, big and small. Life throws curveballs and we may not achieve all we desire in the time frame we are given. Kindness, however, is not one of those things to be left by the wayside. In this book, Salzberg shows us the way.

The Kindness Handbook: A Practical Companion is published via Sounds True and is available via their website, in local bookstores or electronically. For more information about Sharon Salzberg and her work, visit this site or subscribe to her podcast.