When my daughter was a toddler, we were flying home from a visit with some relatives and had a layover in Dallas-Fort Worth. We had plenty of time to get to our gate, until everything went wrong. Our stroller, which had been gate-checked, was sent to the baggage claim. Things kept going downhill from there. During our stroller-induced trials and tribulations, our flight was moved to another terminal. A gate agent unhelpfully told me, “You’re going to miss your flight.”
As I rushed to the other terminal, I began to cry. Most people passed by without noticing or, if they did notice, they just kept walking. I don’t blame them. I’m sure many of them were in a hurry to get where they needed to go, and others probably felt that what was going on in my life was none of their business. But one woman asked me what was wrong and walked briskly alongside me as I told her. She couldn’t fix my situation, but the fact that she cared was comfort enough… and in the end, the flight was delayed, so we made it.
All around us there are people who just want to know that someone cares about what they’re going through. Most of us are probably pretty good at offering support to our closest friends and family members, but we may not bother to reach out to other people — strangers, coworkers, neighbors, people we just see from time to time. We have busy lives and may assume that surely someone is reaching out to them, someone who is closer to them than us. Sometimes we’re afraid to reach out. We feel that another person’s situation is none of our business, or we’re afraid that by bringing up a painful situation, we’ll just hurt the suffering person more.
Let’s assume instead that by reaching out, we can really make a difference in that person’s life.
What’s the worst that can happen? Maybe a person will tell us that what they are going through is none of our business. Maybe they’ll start to cry (and maybe those tears will be good for them). Maybe several people have already asked after them, and they’re ready to move on. Maybe they’ll be so grateful that someone cares that they’ll talk our ears off, forcing us either to be gently assertive in order to end the conversation or to deal with more than we’d bargained for. Some of these things are unpleasant, but none are horrible.
But… what if no one has bothered to reach out to them? What if they are yearning to know that someone cares?
One of the kindest things we can do for another person is to get over our hangups and reach out to them. More often than not, we’ll find that it’s not too much trouble and that the person we are coming alongside appreciates our efforts. We may not be able to do this for everyone around us, but if we start to make a habit of looking out for ways we can reach out to others, we’ll touch a lot of lives.