Leon Logothetis: If You Stop Opening Your Heart, You Stop Living.

At the Podium with Patrick Huey

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Pinocchio. The Blue Fairy. And the Yellow Motorcycle.

Pinocchio had only one wish. To be a real boy. And the Blue Fairy who brings him to life will grant him that wish if he can prove to be a brave, truthful, and selfless person. As with all things in life, our goals often come with conditions, and they can easily get entangled in the twists and jumbles of our circumstances and our choices. And thus, the movie of Pinocchio unfolds. The wooden puppet Pinocchio, cobbled together by his father Geppetto, breathed to life by a Blue Fairy, embarks on a complex life of drinking, smoking, and gambling. As circumstances escalate, he narrowly escapes being sold into slavery. It isn’t until he is forced to save the life of Geppetto that Pinocchio redeems himself. In saving his father he finally proves that he is brave, truthful, and selfless, all the things that would make him a real boy. But the price for Geppetto’s life is Pinocchio’s death. Staying true to her word, however, the Blue Fairy reawakens Pinocchio to life as a real boy. The wish is fulfilled.

In his book and TV series The Kindness Diaries, Leon Logothetis is granting wishes. Not for large acts of heroism, but for everyday people who have demonstrated simple acts of kindness to a stranger. His well-documented journey around the world on a yellow motorcycle borne on the kindness of strangers wasn’t about him getting stuff for himself; it was about him getting entrée to people whose lives he could change. What Leon describes as the kindness of small gestures. The whispers of kindness that can really transform a person. As he says, “How you show up moment to moment is far more important than doing something huge.” The Emperor Shah Jahan of India built the Taj Mahal for his dead love. Leon buys a plan ticket for a man and his wife living in the Midwest of America, to attend their son’s wedding in London. The small kindnesses.

Leon’s story is not that of Willy Wonka or even the Blue Fairy. His journey to kindness was built from his own sense of aloneness and brokenness. Those childhood pains were a springboard to his life today – leading a global kindness revolution.

Unlike Pinocchio, Leon isn’t looking for the fast, risky life. Real danger from Leon’s perspective is the risk of living a vulnerable life. Of living a life from your heart. And like the story of Pinocchio, Leon reminds us: don’t quit before the miracle happens.
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