On January 17^th, 2018, the entirety of Clear Springs watched a presentation put on by Houston Kraft that emphasized the importance of spreading kindness, empathy and awareness of others. Kraft is the co-founder of Character Strong and has worked with, according to his website, “over 600 schools or events since 2016.”

At the end of the assembly, Kraft asked our school to do him a favor.

“Do me a favor: in between everything else, write a postcard. In between everything else, notice people,” Kraft said. “In between everything else, in those quiet, forgettable moments, choose love, and live an unforgettable life.”

Kraft does not claim to be the perfect Samaritan, though.

“I’m working everyday towards living a life in alignment with the things I talk about,” Kraft said.

Becoming the best person you can be is no easy task, and Kraft finds himself contemplating philosophical questions about himself and the world all the time. 2 quotes specifically actually.

“There are two quotes I think about a lot. They kind of mess up my brain. The first one is, ‘Life is our awareness,’ which means the entirety of our life experience is only what we’re aware of. Anything that we’re not aware of literally does not exist to us,” Kraft said.

Awareness was mentioned during his assembly as well, for Kraft believes awareness is essential into making one’s life bigger, which happens to directly correlate to his second quote.

“The second quote I parrot with my brain is, ‘How much bigger our life gets when we make ourselves smaller.’ A lot of times, when we only look at life through our own perspective, it makes our lives pretty small,” Kraft said. “Kindness, in practice, actually makes your life pretty big. I like that idea.”

A Student’s Perspective

“There is no amount of words to describe the character and passion this man holds so dearly to his heart. Houston has been going to many different schools, leaving everyone better than he found it for 8 years now. Kraft speaks his heart about spreading love and doing good deeds, but he wants people to know the power that helping someone out will bring to them or yourself. There is not a place Kraft has been that was not positively impacted by his speaking. Kraft displayed so much passion for the love he had that some kids were brought to tears from the emotion Kraft put into his speech.

During the assembly, instead of getting angry with people disrupting he begged for them to be quiet for the others who wanted to listen, and with such politeness, he got the point across without being negative.

Mr. Houston Kraft is an absolute one of a kind person. Nobody will ever come close to the passion he has for caring and spreading love. He is the light in this world and will do anything possible to make the world a better place. Even after his presentation, Kraft stayed behind to speak to students one-on-one, displaying that he is a sweetheart whether everyone is watching, or no one is.” – Colton Grier