"HOW are you? Good. You? I’m good, too."

How different life would be if we could all say these familiar words and really mean them, rather than doing ourselves and others down by believing the negative images of human nature that fill our newspapers, televisions and Facebook feeds.

According to the Christian faith, every human being is made in the image of God - that’s even better than ‘good’ - with the desire and ability to do good. We are designed for goodness and it goes with the grain to do good things. We feel good when we do little things…hold a door open for a fellow shopper, or smile at a stranger and get a smile in return.

Many of us learn this at primary or Sunday school, or the Brownies. "A Brownie Guide thinks of others before herself

and does a good turn every day," after all.

But life can knock this consciousness of our own goodness out of us somehow. All we see is our weaknesses and failures. We blame ourselves, the people around us, or both - that we are not the people that Brown Owl said we would be.

But if we make the effort to open our eyes, we can see that goodness is still there, within us and without. When a rough sleeper at the Manna House drop-in offers to help serve lunch - or a woman from the refuge makes a coffee for a volunteer - we know it, and we know we’re all the same, just trying to be the best we can.

Lois Sparling, Manna House, Kendal