After quitting his soul-crushing desk job, Leon Logothetis from Netflix’s “The Kindness Diaries” is giving back one person at a time.
Leon Logothetis from Netflix’s “The Kindness Diaries” explains.
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| Logothetis playing cricket in India. |
By Pat King, Metro
We all have a laundry list of things we’d much rather do than toil
away to pay the rent. Unfortunately, rent ain’t cheap, and perks like
food and heating aren’t included for free. But with Thanksgiving right
around the corner, it’s a good time to take stock of the bounty we have,
and what we could potentially be doing for others.
[post_ads]That inclination inspired author and TV personality Leon Logothetis to hand in his notice, jump on a motorcycle and film “The Kindness Diaries,”
which aired on Netflix and has just been picked up for another season
in 2018. Logothetis spent years as a successful stockbroker in London
only to find money didn’t bring him happiness. “On the outside, I pretty
much had everything, in a materialistic sense,” he says, “but on the
inside, I had not too much at all. I was very depressed, very
disconnected, and really didn't have any sense of purpose. I felt, in
many ways, I was wearing a mask.”
After seeing the film adaptation of “The Motorcycle Diaries,”
about the travels of a young Che Guevara, Logothetis decided to quit
his job and hit the road. “It was really a tipping point,” he shares,
and “it pushed me over the edge … in a good way.”
His plan was to plot a road trip across America — living on $5 a day
and relying on the kindness of strangers along the way. The trip was
everything he could have hoped for, but however large the initial stack
of fivers was, it eventually ran out. So he went on to work as a
television producer in Hollywood. After a few years, he noticed himself
falling back into the same habits as his broker days, and needed to
break free once again.
“I was walking down the street near Hollywood Boulevard,” he
remembers, “and I saw this homeless chap who had a sign that said
‘Kindness is the Best Medicine.’ There was something about that sign
that just touched me in a profound way.”
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He quit this job (again), bought a vintage yellow motorcycle with a
passenger car, and set back out on the road — this time with the mission
to help others. He made it a point that for every act of kindness
received, he would return the favor by giving that unsuspecting stranger
a life-changing gift. While in Pittsburgh, a homeless man helped
Logothetis find shelter and food for the night; in exchange, Logothetis
offered to send the man to culinary school and set him up in an
apartment. “I call them ‘gifts,’ but really they’re opportunities,” he
says. “I gave him an opportunity and it’s up to him what he does with
that opportunity.”
After writing a book about his experiences, he was approached by
Netflix with the idea of turning "The Kindness Diaries" into a show. The
show was a hit, and Logothetis and his crew are preparing to start
filming season 2 this January.
So what if you don’t have the necessary means to make the same
radical change? According to him, the answer is simple: “Ultimately,
what defines us is how we show up in the world, and how we choose to
treat ourselves, and how we treat each other. Does that mean that work
isn’t important? Of course not! But if all we do is work, and we don't
help other people, then we’re living a hollow life. Go out and make as
much money as you can. But at the same time, change as many lives as you
can by simply being kind.”
What a perfect sentiment to write in your two-week notice!
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