One of those amazing pieces of research shows that having friends and supporters who you can really count on, in tough times, creates a significant impact on everything from longevity to success at work (duh!)

Most of us think that means that we should reach out to others when we need them. By creating a network of friends, old and new, fun and serious, we create a scaffold of support that surrounds us in good and bad.

What if we turn that idea around on its head a bit and instead look for ways that we can support others when they need it or even when they don’t.

One of my clients coaches a HS girl’s basketball team. This past weekend he told me about how one of the girls on the team made an unforced error in the last few seconds of the game that cost her team a win. Despite that error, she had played an incredible overall game defending the other team’s best player and holding her to just 2 points. After the game, he told her how proud he was of her and how “despite the loss, she should be proud of herself too.”

He emailed this story to me with the comment. “This is why I love to coach.” As President of his division, he takes the same approach with his work teammates, seeking out their successes and losses and helping them to find the good while improving the bad.

There is probably someone in your world who could use a lift today or maybe you might want to just initiate a thank you to a colleague who did a good job this week. The stronger our scaffold of support, the higher it can be built.

© Richard Citrin, All rights reserved, 2018