Welcome to episode 266 of Live Happy Now.

This is Paula Phelps, and this week we're talking about something that all of us have access to and all of us could use a little more of.

Kindness.

As an Emmy-winning reporter for the ABC News, Adrian Banker has covered some of life's most tragic moments, but that's

never made her lose sight of her desire to find the best in people. Her experience interviewing

inspiring people, from wounded warriors to high-profile celebrities, helped her discover the power

of kindness, so she's here today to talk about her book, Your Hidden Superpower, and explain how the

power of kindness can transform our own lives as well as the lives of those around us.

Adrienne, welcome to Live Happy Now. Thank you, Paul. It's good to be with you. It's exciting to have you

on the show because you have a project that could not have come at a better

time. And so I wanted to start by asking you what it was that made you decide to explore the

topic of kindness. Well, it was at a time of my life where I had so many things to be grateful for.

You know, my career was at a great place. I was traveling all over the

world, interviewing some of the most interesting and influential people in the world. And I still

felt this gloominess just that feeling like, what am I missing? And I went back to my own goal list.

And I had, you know, written down various things. And one of the things I had written for years was, I'm going to write a book. And my mentor, actually, I don't even know if I talked to him about my goal list. But he called me up one day and said, you know what? You should write a book on kindness. Funny how when you put that thought out there, something happens. Yeah. And I thought he was off. You know, like I was like, why would I write a book on kindness? There's tons of books on kindness, you know? And he said, yeah, but you have a different perspective. So you need to write it. And I just listened, you know, because he's given me advice for so many years, I figured it's probably best to listen to him than to listen to myself complain about what am I missing.

So I intentionally went on an exploration for why we feel that gloom or that dissatisfaction in

life sometimes when we could sit down and write a list of 20 things

were grateful for. You know, a lot of people have gratitude journals. And I think that for me and I

speak for a group of people on the planet who had things to be grateful for, but still didn't

know why we weren't contented or why we weren't hitting our stride or feeling like we were fulfilled.

And surprisingly, to me, the practice of kindness I had in my life was a lot more powerful than I realized.

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