Kindness sounds simple, but it is not always easy. For many men, giving kindness can feel awkward and accepting kindness can feel even harder. An offer of help may be heard as, “I don’t think you can cope”; concern can feel like pity and support can feel like interference. A compliment can be brushed aside as someone simply trying to ingratiate themselves. The simple question “Are you alright?” will almost always receive the automatic answer:
“I’m fine, and you?”
Even when fine is the last thing we are.
There isn’t one way of being a man, and we should be wary of pretending there is. Men are no more a single psychological group than women are. Many men, however, grow up absorbing some remarkably persistent messages about what being a man is supposed to look like: be strong, sort it out, don’t make a fuss, don’t burden other people, keep going.
There are admirable qualities within these ideas: independence, resilience, responsibility and the ability to remain steady when things become difficult. They are not things we should simply dismiss.
The difficulty is that kindness often reaches us at precisely the point where those ideas are being tested. Someone notices we are struggling, upset, frightened, lonely or simply not managing quite as well as usual. Accepting their kindness means acknowledging, at least to ourselves, that something is going on, and that can bring us into territory many men have been taught to be wary of: emotion.
Perhaps the issue is not that men lack emotion, but that many have learned to keep certain emotions private, minimise them or express them in ways that feel safer. Anger may be tolerated where fear is not. Frustration may be easier to admit than hurt, while determination may be praised and uncertainty quietly hidden.
Yet having emotions is not a weakness. They are part of being human. Perhaps strength lies not in suppressing them, but in being able to recognise them, make room for them and decide what we do with them.
Research on traditional masculinity and help-seeking has repeatedly linked stronger endorsement of masculine norms with greater reluctance to ask for help and greater stigma around doing so. Work on compassion and masculinity has also found that self-reliance and emotional control are particularly important parts of that picture.[1][2]
Kindness between men can carry its own particular awkwardness.
When kindness comes from another man
Many men are perfectly comfortable doing things for one another: giving someone a lift, helping with a job, buying a drink or simply turning up when something needs doing. None of these acts needs much explanation. The kindness is there, but it is often hidden inside the action.
Perhaps that is partly why practical kindness can be easier both to give and to receive. Nobody has to name what is happening. A lift can simply be a lift. A cup of coffee can simply be a cup of coffee.
It can become more difficult when the kindness is direct.
“You don’t seem yourself.”
“I’m worried about you.”
“You don’t have to deal with this on your own.”
Now something different is happening. One man has taken the risk of noticing and saying something, and the other has to decide what to do with it. The easiest response may be a joke, a change of subject or the familiar, “I’m fine.”
Vulnerability can be particularly difficult because it exposes things we, as men, may have learned to keep hidden. Yet it is also one of the things that reveals our humanity. Fear, hurt, uncertainty and the need for other people do not make someone less of a man. They remind us that behind the role, the competence and the self-control there is still a human being.
Perhaps part of what makes accepting kindness difficult is not so much a fear of losing dignity, but a fear of being diminished in another person’s eyes: being pitied, being seen as incapable, or having someone take over because they think we cannot manage. These things can feel very different from being helped.
That is why the way kindness is offered matters. Kindness offered badly can reinforce the fear of being diminished; kindness offered quietly and with respect can do the opposite.
Kindness should never require someone to feel smaller in order to receive it.
And when kindness between two men is offered and accepted without embarrassment, ridicule or loss of respect, something rather important can happen. The man offering it may discover that expressing concern does not make him less of a man. The man receiving it may discover that allowing himself to be seen has not cost him the respect of another man.
There is something else in accepting kindness: it allows the other person to give it. We do not have to immediately do something in return, make light of it or restore some imaginary balance. Sometimes accepting what another person freely offers is enough.
Research into men’s social relationships suggests that some men find it difficult to confide in other men, while others develop close, supportive relationships that become valuable sources of connection and wellbeing. The research also cautions against treating men as though they all relate in the same way.[3]
The relationship may have changed slightly. There is now permission for a different kind of conversation. The first accepted act of kindness may not transform a friendship overnight, but it may make the next one easier, and the one after that.
What does accepting kindness actually look like for a man?
Probably nothing very dramatic.
It may begin with noticing the moment when our instinct is to refuse: “No, I’m alright.” “Don’t worry about me.” “I’ll sort it.” Sometimes those answers are perfectly true, but sometimes they are automatic, spoken before we have even considered whether we might actually welcome what is being offered.
Accepting kindness may simply mean giving ourselves a moment before saying no.
Sometimes that kindness may be practical. At other times it may simply be another person’s presence. It might mean accepting the company of a friend who knows we’re not quite ourselves, without feeling that we have to explain what is wrong or pretend to be better company than we are. We might drink coffee, watch television, do something ordinary or say very little. The kindness lies partly in the other person being there without demanding anything from us.
At other times it may mean accepting a compliment without immediately making a joke at our own expense, allowing someone to say that they are worried about us without becoming defensive, or answering “How are you?” with something slightly more truthful than “Fine.”
None of this requires us to surrender our independence. Nor does accepting kindness mean accepting everything that is offered. Kindness still needs respect, and we remain entitled to say no.
The difference is whether the answer is really no, or whether it comes from an old reflex that says needing or accepting something from another person somehow makes us less capable. Accepting kindness may sometimes require us to resist that reflex: allowing someone to do something for us without immediately feeling we must do something in return, accepting concern without assuming it is pity, and allowing ourselves to be noticed without feeling that we have somehow been exposed.
Sometimes saying “thank you” and meaning it requires a little bravery.
A genuine thank you acknowledges that another person saw something in us, responded to it and that their kindness mattered. In doing so, we are also admitting that, for a moment, we were vulnerable enough to receive it. It also tells the other person where they stand. Their kindness has been recognised and accepted, and they do not have to wonder whether they embarrassed us, intruded or somehow got it wrong.
It can be tempting to make a joke, minimise what happened or immediately find some way of doing something in return. But sometimes allowing the words “thank you” to stand on their own is enough. The kindness has been given, received and acknowledged. Nothing needs to be settled.
There is evidence that helping others is associated with a modest increase in the wellbeing of the person doing the helping, and that gratitude following another person’s kindness can encourage further prosocial behaviour.[4][5] Accepting kindness, then, need not be a one-way transaction. It can allow both people to take part in something worthwhile.
Accepting kindness takes strength
Perhaps accepting kindness is not about becoming softer, more emotional or less independent. It may simply be about allowing another person to matter.
For many men, that can feel unfamiliar. We are often much more comfortable being useful than being helped, giving rather than receiving, coping rather than admitting that something has got to us. But accepting kindness does not take away our independence, competence or dignity.
Sometimes it asks something rather different of us: enough confidence to let another person see us as we are, enough courage to accept what they offer, and enough respect for both of us to let a simple “thank you” be enough.
Perhaps strength is not always found in standing alone. Sometimes it is found in knowing that we do not have to.
References
1. Üzümçeker, E. (2025). Traditional Masculinity and Men’s Psychological Help-Seeking: A Meta-Analysis. International Journal of Psychology, 60(2), e70031. https://doi.org/10.1002/ijop.70031
2. Kirby, J. N., Day, J., & Gilbert, P. (2024). Social rank and compassion: How insecure striving, social safeness and fears of compassion mediate the relationship between masculinity, depression and anxiety. Psychology and Psychotherapy: Theory, Research and Practice, 97(2), 339–353. https://doi.org/10.1111/papt.12520
3. McKenzie, S. K., Collings, S., Jenkin, G., & River, J. (2018). Masculinity, Social Connectedness, and Mental Health: Men’s Diverse Patterns of Practice. American Journal of Men’s Health, 12(5), 1247–1261. https://doi.org/10.1177/1557988318772732
4. Hui, B. P. H., Ng, J. C. K., Berzaghi, E., Cunningham-Amos, L. A., & Kogan, A. (2020). Rewards of kindness? A meta-analysis of the link between prosociality and well-being. Psychological Bulletin, 146(12), 1084–1116. https://doi.org/10.1037/bul0000298
5. Ma, L. K., Tunney, R. J., & Ferguson, E. (2017). Does gratitude enhance prosociality? A meta-analytic review. Psychological Bulletin, 143(6), 601–635. https://doi.org/10.1037/bul0000103
