Hug someone

Another in the occasional Being Human series of posts.

I’m very late to the party on this one. It’s been going on for years. The video has been seen 30 million times on YouTube. The guy who started this (and if his real name is Juan Mann, I will eat my computer) has been on Oprah and had lots of attention. Some will think this devalues the underlying notion. But I don’t think so.

I believe in the power of these moments. We call them “random kindness” because we’re still a little afraid sometimes to say “love” in the same sentence with “stranger.” We don’t have all the words we need for all the different kinds of love there are. But this is the love that simply acknowledges and celebrates that we are human and that we are all in this together. I’ve been thinking about that this week. And this seems to fit right in (thank you, Jennifer, for turning me on to it).

Read the story of how free hugs got started over at MySpace, and find out more history here.

I hope you hug someone today, and I hope they hug you back. It doesn’t have to be a stranger. It will feel just as good if it’s someone you know.

5 thoughts on “Hug someone”

  1. What amazes me about this is that it is still going on and that people all over the world have stood out on street corners and held up signs offering free hugs. Are they wanting hugs or just wanting to give them away?

    There are a lot of people who need hugs.

    I like the way he really takes a second to really see the person he’s hugging when they let him.

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  2. I think they want both, maybe. What I would want if I did it is to give hugs to people, and to receive the hug as a tangible symbol of this connection, as a sort of “thank you.” But if someone really needed a hug and couldn’t hug back, that’d be fine. So I suppose the real point is the giving.

    I liked that he sees the people too. That’s what makes it a real hug.

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