A former ICU nurse and close friend told me tonight that she wanted to start the new year on a positive note. I nodded, trying to absorb her optimism, but deep down, it felt like an impossible belief to hold onto.

Earlier in the evening, I finished watching Selena: The Series on Netflix. Tears streamed down my face, not just for Selena but for all those whose greatness was taken too soon. JFK. Robert Kennedy. Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X. Medgar Evers. John Lennon. Selena. And then, the faces of school shootings flashed through my mind—children and teachers. Some were destined for greatness; others hadn’t even had the chance to imagine a future. All snatched away.

The memories of my nursing career flooded back, uninvited but vivid. ER nursing and the surgical-trauma ICU had left permanent imprints on my soul. I had seen so much—too much. The abused children were the hardest to forget. I remembered a little boy with fractured hips, his terrified eyes and small frame trembling in the hospital bed. His parents claimed he’d fallen out of a bunk bed, but the truth came out: he had been thrown down the staircase.

The surgical-trauma ICU brought its own share of heartbreak. There was the 18-year-old who didn’t wear his seat belt. He’d been doing drugs and crossed the line, crashing head-on into another car and killing the driver. He was paralyzed from the neck down. His mother called the ICU every morning, her voice filled with fragile hope: “How’s my son?” We all knew the answer she didn’t want to hear. Eventually, the EEGs showed no brain activity, and we pulled the plug.

And then there was the college student. A fight with her boyfriend had pushed her over the edge—literally. She jumped seven stories from her dorm room. I didn’t need a stethoscope to confirm her death. One look at her fractured, porcelain face told me everything. “Let’s put in a few chest tubes before we call it,” the surgical-trauma ICU doctor said. The residents practiced, and then they pronounced her. I had a chair ready for her mother. I braced myself for hysterical screams, but when her mother arrived, there was only silence—a catatonic stare. I placed my hand on her shoulder, offering the only comfort I could. Tears fell silently down her face. Mine, too.

The adolescent unit on behavioral health was no easier. I still see the young girl with scars up and down her arms and legs. Her brother had sexually assaulted her, and her parents refused to believe her. On the night shift, I held her head to stop her from slamming it against the concrete wall, praying she would find a reason to fight for herself.

Where am I going with all of this? Maybe it’s to say that we are what we live and what we’ve lived through.

Despite everything, I am thankful. I am thankful for my children and my grandchildren. I cherish their laughter, their hugs, and the homemade ornaments they hang on my Christmas tree. I hold doors open for others—women, men, children. I help strangers when I can, like the time I overheard an elderly man at the pharmacy saying, “I ain’t got dat kind of money,” and paid for his insulin.

There’s so much hatred in the world, but I’ve learned we can choose to undo it, one act of kindness at a time.

Tonight, I didn’t go out to celebrate New Year’s Eve. Instead, I sat close to my two dogs. One of them trembles at the sound of firecrackers, so I gave him some medication to calm his nerves. I rescued him years ago, but in truth, he rescued me.

Kindness—it’s the simplest thing we can offer, but it carries the weight of change. Be that one small pebble that creates ripples of good in a sea of chaos. Be the difference, no matter how small it seems.

Debbie Moore-Black is a nurse who blogs at Do Not Resuscitate.