The Supply and Demand of Kindness

The day before the fall, I did something I’d never done before: I picked up a hitchhiker. He was standing at my highway exit, hands waving in unison. I surprised myself by pulling over. He didn’t turn out to be a monster.

I was taking a short solo ski trip and driving our only family car. My wife was a little anxious and warned me, “don’t do anything stupid, I won’t be able to visit you in the hospital”

There’s something about skiing I can’t resist. I’m in awe of the majestic vistas and mono-chromatic landscapes. The solitude of the soft white snow that dissipates everything including my anxieties.

But there’s also the sense of unknown, adventure and challenge. The gratifying sense of achievement when I traverse a particularly tricky run or discover new terrain.

And so, I found myself throwing Elaine’s cautionary warning to the wind and inexplicably turning left to an unexplored double black run. It all started so well, Indigo Girls jamming with me. My AI coach Carv was encouraging me with pleasant pings whenever I made a particularly smooth parallel turn.

Then, all of sudden, I don’t remember the details: maybe I suddenly panicked at my increasing speed, or I met with an unexpected bump. I careened out of control. I must have fallen 20-30 vertical feet before my boots finally provided enough traction

I looked up and only then realized my skis were way above me, poles who knows where. The surface beneath the thin layer of snow was pure ice — every time I tried to climb back up, I just slid down again.

Then a stranger appeared. He side-slipped down to my skis, collected them, made his way over. I thanked him, tried to stand — and slid another five feet. He picked everything up again. No impatience, no fuss.

“Same thing happened to me yesterday - it sucks!” he said.

At his suggestion, I stopped fighting. Instead of scrambling up, I slid down with my gear to a flatter spot. What had been terrifying suddenly wasn’t.

He skied off with a wave. I never got his name. But I’m still carrying something — 4 days later — from that moment: a glow of gratitude I can’t quite shake. A debt I can only pay forward.

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Kevin Kelly has a piece called “How Will the Miracle Happen Today?” It’s not another exhortation to be kind. His insight runs the other way: for kindness to flow, you need people willing to receive it. He calls them “kindees.”

Kelly spent his twenties hitchhiking to work, traveling through Asia on the generosity of strangers. Kindness always showed up, he noticed — but only when he was open to it. The problem is most of us aren’t. We armor up. Wave people off. “I’m fine, I’ve got it” — while sliding on ice.

Here’s what struck me: kindness has supply and demand. All our cultural energy goes to the supply side — be kind, give more, pay it forward. But demand matters too. If everyone’s self-sufficient and armored, all that kindness has nowhere to land. The stranger who helped me needed me to accept his help. His gift from yesterday would have dead-ended otherwise.

Being a good kindee isn’t weakness. It’s the other half of the economy.

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Maybe that’s why I love skiing. And why I love startups. Both put you in exposed positions. You can’t fake competence when your gear is scattered across the slope. And that exposure — the thing we’re taught to minimize — is what makes connection possible.

Skiing has this duality I can’t resist. The solitude of the summit, the white silence, everything including your anxieties absorbed by the snow. But also an invisible web of strangers who’ll stop for you, because they’ve all been humbled by the same mountain.

Elaine was right to worry. But also not quite. The mountain isn’t just where stupid things happen. It’s where strangers help — because yesterday, they were you.

I’m glad the hitchhiker let me pull over.

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I first told this story Rick Lewis’ weekly story gym. And in the telling I realized that this was why I love his story gyms so much: he has architected a space where we are open to kindness by sharing our vulnerable stories, and in turn we receive kindness from the feedback and connections. Thank you Larry Urish , Kathy Ayers, Skip Lackey and Genie Joseph and of course my ski angel for your kindness.