Meeting People Where They Are
We can't remove obstacles and hardships entirely from off of people's backs, but we can sure make it a little bit easier, and that little bit of difference, can really make all the difference.
I've been reminded of an experience that I had probably fifteen years ago or so. Sometimes I would get these certain ideas about hiking certain mountains or trails, and if the mood hit me just right, I would drop everything and just go. Let me preface this tale by telling you that I’ve worked for the U.S. Forest Service long enough that I absolutely have wised up in this regard and I always tell people where I’m going and when I should be back.
But back then I would just pack a backpack and go. Thankfully, I haven't been in too many dangerous situations or anything. But on this particular day, I was hiking Mount Ogden. The mountain poses a pretty significant hike. It's about 16 miles round trip. And it's a pretty arduous uphill climb: eight miles up uphill pretty much the whole way. And the last few miles is straight rock scree which zaps energy really fast.
I had started around noon, thinking that I'd be back by five or so on a summer day where daylight is available really late into the evening. But because the trail was so arduous, it took me longer to get up to the top. My hiking boots didn't fit quite right, and so I developed horrible blisters basically along all the base of my feet. And so I was wincing every step down. And I was telling myself, “Okay, just got to tough this out. Put one step in front of the other.”
I was of steeling myself up so that I could make it down to the bottom of the trail, realizing that, “Hey, I didn't tell anybody that when I should be back and I'm pretty stubborn about being self sufficient and independent. And so, I was preparing to take every step of the way down by myself alone, back to my car. And after about three or four miles of the downhill track, my feet were really, really hurting. And it was getting dark.
And I was getting rather miserable. I wasn't hypothermic or seriously injured or anything. And I was still quite confident that I'd be able to make it down. But I still remember exactly where it was when I first heard my sister's voice calling after me about five or six switchbacks below me. I was about two miles away from the trailhead, and I wasn't anticipating anybody to meet me. I didn't ask anybody to hike up. I didn't have a cell phone at the time. Most people didn't back then. And so I didn't have anybody I knew of watching out for my return. But my sister and my mom met me up the trail. They had hiked up the trail about two miles to meet me because it was getting late and they were worried about me.
I still had to make all of those steps back down. Still had to make those two mile on my horrible feet. But the experience of having two people cheering me on, putting some of the weight off of my feet. Giving me their shoulder to lean on a little bit. That made all the difference. I remember those two miles were so much easier, so much more doable, because I had help. And then when I got back down to the house, they were so kind to help bandage up my feet, disinfect the blisters. My feet still hurt for weeks, honestly. But since this experience, I’ve really tried to think of some ways that I could make the world a little bit safer, a little bit gentler, a little bit kinder, right where I am with the people that I meet, right in the community where I live.
And meeting people where they we happen to run into is one thing sure. Being kind when we're in the grocery store, or not being rude to coworkers, or biting our tongue when we have something unkind or rude to say to family members, that's a good thing. We should try to do that. We have a lot of control over what we say, and how we act. And if we give ourselves that 10 seconds of breathing before we respond and react that can help avoid a lot of hurt. But I think that there's maybe another step that we can take. It's one thing to meet people where we are but it's something different when we meet them where they are trying to anticipate their needs maybe a little bit more.
This could translate into caring about how they are experiencing their world right now. And looking for ways of removing obstacles and stumbling blocks, and rocks and pebbles that people could stumble on along the trail, metaphorically, and maybe actually offering your shoulder for someone to lean on to give support. I've got to think that that support would be at least as significant as that hiking experience was for me for the people that are in our lives right now. And hopefully, maybe someone comes right to mind of someone that we could reach out to right now, and make their day just a little bit better, just a little bit more doable. We can't remove obstacles and hardships entirely from off of people's backs, but we can sure make it a little bit easier, and that little bit of difference, can really make all the difference.
Our individual impact might seem small, but if we all did this, can we imagine the impact we could have? There might only be a couple hundred people who read this post, but if those 200 people inspire three other people then the ripple effect could really get going.