Kindness without hope

As someone who likes to watch movies and read books, there’s one trope that, exhausting as it can be—or cliché as some might find it—I still have a certain fondness for. It’s the old, good rags-to-riches arc, wherein the protagonist moves from poverty or obscurity to wealth, fame, or success. Stories that highlight themes of perseverance, talent, and social mobility.

Movies like Slumdog Millionaire. Rocky. The Social Network. The Pursuit of Happyness.

Or even… Cinderella.

These stories almost always emphasize the possibility of constant upward progression. There’s a continuous rise to a higher level of achievement.

Cinema taught me to expect the arc—the rise, the breakthrough, the redemption. The familiar trajectory of storytelling: the rags-to-riches transformation, the hard-earned victory, the life that finally turns around.

And in many of these stories, kindness is rarely wasted. If anything, it’s the opposite. It’s the engine that propels the protagonist forward. Good deeds matter. Virtue bends the narrative in your favor.

For me, the appeal is simple. If it can happen to them, it can happen to me.

At least, in theory.

In reality, however, many lives—including my own—unfold without such an arc.

This is a realization I came to after hearing Ocean Vuong speak on The Interview, a podcast from The New York Times. He has a point: we want stories of change, yet our lives are often static.

We drive the same car. We live in the same house for years. We go to the same grocery store year after year.

We dream of a life that can be, not life as it is.

So if we’re stuck in the latter—if change slips through our fingers and life remains static and rooted in more ways than one—would we still be willing to be kind?

Vuong calls this kindness without hope. That is, if we peel kindness off the usual scaffolding we build around it, e.g.: progress, reward, transformation, redemption, then what?

What if kindness leads nowhere?

Not nowhere in the emotional sense. But nowhere in the cinematic sense.

Vuong argues that for some people, it doesn’t matter. Inside that stillness, in the community where he once lived, people dig each other out of snowbanks. People still lend a hand. People still show up for one another.

Not because it will change their trajectory. Not because someone is watching. Not because it guarantees reciprocity.

They still do it, even knowing that in the grand scheme of things, things won’t change. Tomorrow looks exactly like today.

But perhaps it’s not that kindness doesn’t matter.

Perhaps the better question is this: what if kindness is not a strategy? What if it’s not an investment vehicle with a stable, expected return?

What if kindness is an expression of being, not a lever for becoming?

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Kindness in organizations

Even inside organizations.

In many narratives, kindness is instrumental. It’s engraved in company values. It’s talked about in performance appraisals. Repeated in the hallways after Town Hall.

The expectation to model kindness. To become the ambassador for good.

There’s an expectation that comes with it. You help someone and later that act “pays off.” You check a box on your performance appraisal. You get a pat on the back from your manager. It redeems your mediocre performance or helps lift your already exceptional performance to a new height. You get promoted.

But what about kindness that doesn’t get a spotlight?

Kindness that whispers, not shouts. Kindness that lives beyond the views and likes of social media. 

‍What about kindness that is lived in, not performative?

Kindness that persists even after being lied to, threatened, or disrespected in front of others. Kindness that comes from trembling hands.

‍What about kindness that knows it will not fix the system?

Kindness that may not save your job. Kindness that may not solve the friction you have with your peers.

‍Will you still choose to show up?

Kindness without hope might mean kindness untethered from outcome. Not nihilistic. Not cynical. Just unhooked from the fantasy—or unreasonable expectation—that it must scale, fix, or transform in order to justify itself.

It is almost defiant.

A quiet refusal to let harsh conditions determine the texture of your character.

I see this as something radical. If kindness does not depend on hope for improvement, then it becomes a kind of integrity. A way of saying: even if the arc does not bend, even if upward mobility is out of reach, even if the job stays the same, I will still treat you as worthy of care.

Novel? Perhaps not.

Subversive? Probably, especially in a culture obsessed with upward arrows.

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Kindness and maintenance

From the lens of a human system, the kindness Ocean talks about is not dissimilar from the idea of maintenance. Both highlight the human aspect of one’s job. I’d argue that kindness is the fuel that keeps maintenance going: it requires the care to sit with a colleague from a different department—someone you rarely talk to—who is quietly furious that her recommendation was overruled. To be present for a colleague who has lost her parents. To care for your manager who is sandwiched between leadership’s highest aspirations and the expectations of the team.

And this is where kindness without hope resonates with me.

Maintenance sounds good on paper. Even people who are unfamiliar with System Work often say the idea feels warm and comforting. But putting it into practice is where the challenge begins.

First, maintenance is not part of most job descriptions. It isn’t measured. It isn’t trained for. Often, it goes unnoticed.

Second, maintenance costs something. Our time. Our energy. Our effort. Sometimes it means other aspects of our work have to wait.

Third, maintenance does not guarantee that the system—in this case, the company—will get better. It may support the health of the organization. But does it guarantee that it will turn the tide? No one can say for sure.

Which begs the question: why do we bother?

For those who have practiced this for years, the answer is usually simple: because they care.

Because if they don’t, the system fragments.

Granted, caring does not guarantee that the system improves. But at the very least, one person who cares is better than none at all.

Not because they expect something in return. Not because they hold a fantasy of how the company should be.

And so Vuong’s words remind me that kindness is the fuel that keeps us going. It’s the quiet encouragement that keeps us from throwing in the towel when things get tough. Or unbearable.

But kindness is not just moral. It’s also structural. Sometimes it’s the only thing that keeps the system from breaking—a steadying hand that keeps people from leaving.

More than that, kindness can be our shared language in a world of measurables. It flows from, to, through, and between us—a language that may not change the company for the better, but a language that is needed regardless.

A language that humanizes our workplace.

One that exists between the rigidity of process and structure, and the hierarchy of authority and power. One that persists amid the cold, mechanical tick of the clock and the pressure to perform.

A language that keeps us human.

A language born out of the capacity to give.

Without expecting anything in return.

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I’ve come to think that perhaps there’s a type of kindness that doesn’t change the world. It doesn’t even change our company.

But does it still change the moment?

Is that enough?

Cinema taught me to expect the arc—the rise, the breakthrough, the redemption.

But perhaps some acts of kindness were never meant to change the plot, much less the ending.

Perhaps they were only meant to change the scene.