The Power of Kindness

In an increasingly digital world that often leaves us feeling isolated and lonely, random acts of kindness may hold the key to connection.

Receiving and giving kindness boasts plenty of benefits. While it’s intuitive that receiving kindness enhances well-being, research suggests that when we offer kindness to others, it increases positive emotions and life satisfaction. It’s important that we offer kindness autonomously, without feeling forced to do so, and that we feel our efforts are effective ‌(Xin, Z., Guo, Y., Zheng, J., & Xie, P., 2025).

Simply seeing kindness activates the neuropsychology of kindness, promoting generosity, interpersonal connection, and inclusion. One study showed that watching kindness media in a healthcare setting rapidly increased self-reported feelings of happiness, calm, gratitude, and feeling inspired, decreasing stress and increasing generosity ‌(Fryburg, D. A., 2021).

Author Evelyn Skye’s latest novel, The Incredible Kindness of Paper, explores how one random act of kindness can change the trajectory of a life.

Heather Rose Artushin (HRA): Researchers found that most people, regardless of geographic location or cultural background, are willing to offer small daily acts of kindness to help others. This truth about the prevalence of cooperative behavior around the world is encouraging, particularly for those facing loneliness or a personal crisis, like your character Chloe is in The Incredible Kindness of Paper. How did the power of small acts of kindness inspire your latest book?

Evelyn Skye (ES): That research resonates deeply with what I observed while writing this novel. I was fascinated by what I call the “ripple effect” of kindness—how one small act can create concentric circles of impact far beyond what the original giver ever imagined.

In Chloe’s story, she begins folding origami roses simply to encourage herself after losing her job. But when one accidentally helps a lonely neighbor, Chloe realizes she’s tapped into something profound. Throughout the book, we see how her paper roses create this underground network of connection—a cancer treatment receptionist starts offering them to patients, a car service driver begins engaging more warmly with passengers, and a pair of elderly sisters begins to see their aging not as subtracting from their world but as a new and different lens through which to view it.

What struck me most was exploring how giving and receiving kindness serve different psychological needs. For Chloe, creating the roses provides agency and purpose during a powerless time. For the recipients, it’s often the reminder that they’re seen and valued. The beauty is that neither party needs to understand the full scope of their impact for it to be transformative. Small acts of kindness seem to operate on this almost cellular level—they change us whether we’re consciously aware of it or not.

HRA: Studies show that adults who still have childhood friends in their lives tend to be happier and more satisfied with life. How does reconnecting with a significant person from Chloe’s childhood transform her life? What is special about finding friendship, or in Chloe’s case, romance, with a childhood friend, versus someone you meet as an adult?

ES: This question gets to the heart of what makes Chloe and Oliver’s story so compelling to me. There’s something irreplaceable about someone who knew you before you learned to edit yourself for the world.

When Chloe reconnects with Oliver, she’s reminded of who she was at her core—before disappointments, before she learned to shrink her dreams to fit others’ expectations. Childhood friends hold our unvarnished selves. They remember our authentic enthusiasms and dreams. Oliver recalls Chloe in a zebra hat and rainbow leggings, fearlessly being herself, and that memory becomes a mirror reflecting back her truest nature.

But what’s fascinating is how this works differently from meeting someone new as an adult. Adult relationships often begin with curated versions of ourselves—we present ourselves with our best foot forward. With childhood connections, there’s this shorthand of shared experience and mutual acceptance that’s already established. Oliver doesn't have to explain to Chloe why he finds comfort in mathematical patterns, because she was there when his genius with numbers first developed.

However, I was careful not to romanticize this completely. The flip side is that childhood connections also hold our wounds and failures. Oliver initially hides from Chloe precisely because he’s ashamed of how their story ended. The challenge—and the gift—of reconnecting is learning to integrate who we were with who we’ve become.

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Source: Lavender Public Relations/Used with permission

HRA: What do you hope readers take away from spending time with The Incredible Kindness of Paper?

ES: My deepest hope is that readers close this book with slightly more faith in their own power to matter. Not in grandiose ways, but in the small, daily choices we all make about how to move through the world.

I want someone reading on the subway to maybe look up and smile at a stranger. I want a person having a difficult day to realize they could write an encouraging note to themselves. I want readers to understand that kindness isn’t weakness or naivete—it’s a form of quiet courage and radical resistance to cynicism.

But perhaps most importantly, I hope the book serves as a reminder that we’re all more connected than we realize. In our digital age, it’s easy to feel isolated despite being more “connected” than ever. Chloe and Oliver’s story suggests that the threads linking us to each other—and to our own authentic selves—may be more resilient than we think. Sometimes they just need a gentle tug to remind us they’re still there.

If readers finish this book feeling even slightly more hopeful about humanity, including their own capacity for both giving and receiving love, then I’ve succeeded in what I set out to do.