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Hugh Mackay: ‘Our legacy is whether we succeed or fail in enriching someone else’s life’

Generous, erudite, optimistic and candid … Hugh Mackay knows how to bring out the best in ourselves and in our society, in both good and troubled times.  Writer of 22 books, including 8 novels.

Drawing on the themes of Hugh Mackay’s new book, The Kindness Revolution, Hugh’s conversation with Lindsay Mell will be examining the nature of kindness – presenting it as a unique form of human love, and pondering its crucial role in the building of social cohesion and harmony. They will be talking about listening as one of the most potent acts of kindness, and will be addressing the question: Why are we so reluctant to listen attentively and empathically to each other?

The conversation will also be exploring the social trends that have been reshaping our society over the past 30/40 years and pushing us in the direction of becoming more individualistic, more socially fragmented and, as a result, more lonely, anxious and depressed. Because Hugh Mackay believes that the COVID-19 pandemic has the potential to become a circuit-breaker, the conversation will also explore the ways we might be changed – as individuals and as a society – by its impact. Along the way, Hugh will be offering some tips on how to increase our personal “kindness quotient” if we want to join the kindness revolution.