Opening Eyes, Opening Mind, Opening Heart

Today I realized something that felt heavy, but honest. It became clear to me that we no longer appreciate people for the quiet qualities that make them who they are. Kindness, gentleness, patience, loyalty — these things used to mean something. They were once the foundation of how we saw someone’s worth. But now, it feels like we focus more on popularity, success, status, and image. We notice people only when others are already looking at them.

It’s like we don’t know how to value someone during the process of becoming. If they are still growing, still trying, still working toward their dreams, they are somehow seen as less. And that’s painful, because everyone is always in a process. Everyone is becoming something. But we act as if only the final result deserves love and attention.

What hurts the most is watching how people shift. Someone can be genuine, caring, and full of love — but if they don’t have something to “show,” the world overlooks them. Then, when they finally succeed, suddenly everyone wants to be close to them. Everyone wants to say they knew them. Everyone wants to be associated with them. Not because they appreciated who they were, but because they admire what they’ve gained. That change in attitude reveals where people's values really lie.

It makes me sad because it means we’re losing something beautiful. We’re forgetting how to love people for their heart, for their spirit, for the quiet goodness they carry when no one is watching. And those qualities are the ones that make a person truly irreplaceable.

But I also think there is hope. The world still has people who choose to see beyond the surface, who notice kindness before success, and who love others because of who they are, not what they have. Those people are rare, but they are real. And finding them makes everything feel less lonely.

I hope we move back toward valuing what is genuine. I hope we learn to celebrate the soft-hearted people before the world does. And I hope we learn to love each other in the in-between stages not just when everything is perfect, but while everything is still being built.

Because that is where the real human beauty lives.