This man is Completing 143 Acts of Kindness in 40 Days

Many people will perform a random act of kindness to help others. But Kevin Bonecutter, from Cincinnati, Ohio is taking it much further. He is on a mission to complete 143 acts of kindness in 40 days and he is almost there.

Bonecutter completed his first kind act on June 1, 2023, according to ABC 6 On Your Side. He cleaned up a traffic medium in the city. “It was a median triangle that had a foot and a half of tall grass, and was just full of garbage and a bush that had been run over by cars multiple times,” Bonecutter told ABC. “And I thought, 'How can I make this better?' and then I cut the bush down. But then as I kept driving by it, the grass kept coming and nobody else was cutting it.”

Since then, he has mowed the grass at the medium several times, as well as at homes and vacant businesses. Bonecutter has also  picked up trash, handed out free pizza and snacks, carried groceries in the rain and helped people he met along the way.

“I was driving down the street, it was pouring down rain and there was an elderly man walking with a walker. I pulled over and had the opportunity to drive him to the store and home. It's been a great opportunity to meet and engage with the community,” said Bonecutter.

People are hardwired for kindness
While  Bonecutter’s altruism is remarkable because of the quantity of acts of kindness he is doing, but he is not alone in wanting to lend a helping hand. It turns out that people are actually hardwired to help others.

A recent study conducted by Giovanni Rossi, a sociologist from the University of California Los Angeles and a team of researchers from universities around the world looked at people’s capacity for cooperation, according to a news release from UCLA.

The focus of the study, that was published in Scientific Reports, was to see if people responded positively to small requests for help.  There were 1,000 requests for low-cost decisions and most people reacted positively. The rejection rate was only around 10 percent and when people were unwilling or unable to give a hand, 74 percent of the time they explained why.

The researchers discovered that the results were the same for people in different cultures around the world. “When we zoom in on the micro level of social interaction, cultural difference mostly goes away, and our species’ tendency to give help when needed becomes universally visible,” Rossi said. Being helpful and kind is ingrained in human behavior.

Why do 143 Acts of Kindness?
Why did Bonecutter settle on 143 acts of kindness instead of choosing to do one  a day or choose something like 100 kind acts in a month?

The number 143 holds a special meaning for Bonecutter. He explained to Sunny Skyz that it was another way that Mr Rogers – one of Bonecutter’s heroes and mentors, would say “I love you.” Each number represents the letters in the world. The word I equals the number one, love equals four, and you equals three.  

“The whole idea is to be out here spreading 143 random acts of kindness, but really spreading love and kindness throughout the entire community,” said Bonecutter. “I want to inspire other people to also say, 'Yeah, I want to do this as well,' and let it be a ripple effect. There's enough negativity, let's start some positive ripples and see how far it can go.”

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