CarrollBlog

I firmly believe in small gestures: pay for their coffee, hold the door for strangers, over tip, smile or try to be kind even when you don't feel like it, pay compliments, chase the kid's runaway ball down the sidewalk and throw it back to him, try to be larger than you are-- particularly when it's difficult. People notice, people appreciate. I appreciate it when they're done to (for) me. Small gestures can be an effort, or actually go against our grain ("I'm not a big one for paying compliments..."), but the irony is that almost every time you make them, you feel better about yourself. For a moment life suddenly feels lighter, a bit more Gene Kelly.

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SS has this to say about it:
Your blog today re: how small gestures make you feel lighter, more Gene Kelly like - Joseph Campbell would say the reason for this is "Thou art that" He discusses it more frequently in context of why we care when someone is distressed and they have no connection to us and we have no apparent stake in their life and what happens to them, yet we can care deeply about a child's hurt. It is because "thou art that" you are talking about the positive potential of it which we should all be more conscious of. "To affect the quality of the day, that is the highest of arts." Thoreau
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Here's an interesting link from GB:
gravestones for mobsters in the Ukraine:

http://www.znalezionewsieci.pl/dziwny-jest-swiat/nagrobki-ukrainskich-mafiozow