The other day, my partner and I were talking about how, when we go to the gym, we always find a certain someone who catches our eye and makes us want to keep looking. Today, I had one of those experiences, but to the Nth power. Before I go on, I'm in love with my partner and wouldn't even consider anyone else, but we are both appreciators of beauty and I know she would have agreed with me.

There was not a thing about this young woman that did not appeal to me in the deepest way. I'm not going to describe her here, because everyone has their own idea of perfection. It was not just my body screaming, "I need to have sex with this woman!" - it wasn't that. I'll tell you what I think it was.

From where do we get our sense of what is beautiful? Why do some people appeal to us in that deeper way? When we are born, we cannot see much. It takes time for our eyes to work at their best. So visual beauty is not a genetic inheritance. We have to learn what is beautiful as we learn how to see. Before we are running around the house like wild Indians (I hope that's not a racial slur these days, if so, I apologize, my brothers) we are held, hopefully by loving arms. We learn to look into the eyes of the people who are kind to us. We don't realize it, but a record of that face connected to that good feeling stays imprinted on our brain. Any time a person is kind to us, we get that good feeling and it is stored, along with the face associated with it. Over time, our ideal face becomes an amalgam of every kind face we've stored throughout our lives.

So, the beautiful face is nothing but a comparison with all the kind faces of our pasts. It's why some people can find beauty in fat cheeks, or droopy eyes or large ankles, or whatever. Beauty is only skin deep after all. Well, bone and tissue, too. We filter out all the too large noses and funny ears and what we're left with is an average human look - a beautiful face. But so many of us are not average - we have those large ears and funny noses. There's always someone who's going to be imprinted to like exactly what you have. Beauty is overrated as a reason to partner with a person. But kindness certainly is not rated highly enough.

 Of course, many is the time when I've gotten to know a particularly beautiful woman who turns out to be less-than-beautiful in her soul. Or she has an annoying voice. Or is a Republican. I left the gym today not knowing a thing about her. I thought, on my walk home, if I weren't in a committed relationship, would I even talk to a woman like that? Most probably I would never have the nerve, unless I were manic, but if I did, what would I say? It was then that I came up with the greatest pick-up line ever:

"I've never proposed to someone on a first date before, but if you'll go out with me (sincere puppy-dog eyes)...I just might."

Thinking more about the idea of kindness, there are not that many people in our lives who are actually kind to us. I don't mean just the thousands of people who do no harm to us, but those who actually do positive things for us and give us that good feeling. If we are lucky, our immediate family will be kind to us. Aunts and girl cousins perhaps. Then babysitters (again, if we're lucky). And the handful of really good friends we make in our lives. Sure, there will be infinite instances of kind acts - someone holding a door for you, etc., but you're not going to imprint those things. The imprint of kindness happens when we are young and our minds and personalities are most energetically forming. Your idea of beauty may be an average of only a few dozen faces! It's why we often end up with people who resemble, even a little, our mothers and fathers.

When we act in a kind way towards others, we may be enacting an evolutionary mechanism that knows that if we imprint kindness on other people's brains that we are more likely to be chosen as a mate. It may go way back in our evolutionary history. The early primate who shared his food would be more likely to get sex.  We would remember the face of those with whom we shared food and we would be more likely to be able to pass on our genetic code. That's the prime directive in all animals - pass on the genetic code. It's what we all have in common. So, we are kind to people because it makes us more attractive as a potential mate. Modern humans have evolved to where we can exhibit kindness to anyone, whether or not mating potential is involved. It's a beautiful thing about humans. We can be kind when it gets us nothing in return. We just like the feeling it gives us.

Be anything you want in life, but above all, be kind.