Are You Fueling Their Fight?

21 Sep Are You Fueling Their Fight?

I recently found out that one of my dear friends is having a hell of a ride battling cancer. And around the same time, I got an email about another friend whose husband has needed multiple surgeries and kid might need a kidney transplant.

This got me thinking about how many people around us are going through battles that we don’t know about. I think about all of these people that we see every single day that might be going through the fight of their life and we have no idea.

Maybe that’s you. Maybe you are in the fight of your life right now and nobody knows what you’re going through. Whether it’s physical or mental health. Maybe you’re grieving the loss of a loved one or battling a life-threatening health condition.

If so, then this post isn’t for you.  It’s actually for the people around you.

If you’re not fighting for your life, I want you to think about how you’re going to fuel someone else’s fight for theirs.

It may sound like a heavy responsibility, but it’s actually an opportunity. Every day people are watching us, people are listening to what we say, and see what we post online. How are we using those things to add value and enrich others?

What is Encouragement?

I love and embrace my role as your chief encouragement officer because the word “encourage” means to inspire courage. What is courage? The willingness to show up and fight, to act when you are afraid. And who isn’t afraid? When you go into battle, there’s always fear. You learn to compartmentalize it, to focus on the task at hand, but there’s still fear.

So today, how are we inspiring courage in others? How are we breathing life into other people? How are we going out of our way to share the good news? How are we going out of our way to pay a compliment to somebody? How about we just smile at somebody?

Tell somebody in the office, “Hey, I like those shoes!” “I appreciate how hard you worked on this activity.” “I want you to know that that thing you’re doing has not gone unnoticed.”

Some people just need to know that they’re not alone and that we don’t have to know what they’re going through to support them and cheer for them. Sometimes people want somebody to talk to and sometimes they just want to know somebody cares.

When you’re in the fight of your life and fears and doubts are running through your brain, you just want to know you’re not alone. Because when you think about it, if you were going to fight a dragon, you wouldn’t want to face it by yourself. Sometimes you have to, but you would much rather have people by your side.

People that will give you another sword or shield of encouragement or tips on how to slay the dragon. If you have people to face that dragon with it could still be scary, but it will be less scary when you know you are not alone.

How Can You Fuel Someone’s Fight Today?

What if we treated everybody we interacted with as if they were in the fight of their life? What if we treated that coworker who was in a bad mood as if they were just struggling with a battle and thought of a way to encourage them or show them grace?

How about that friend that just seems too busy for us? What if they’re actually not too busy for us, but they’re battling this depression?  How can we support them instead of feeling angry at them because they “haven’t made the time for us?”

Instead, why don’t we reach out and say, “Hey, I know you’ve got a lot going on that I don’t know about. I just wanted you to know that I’m thinking about you and cheering for you. I’m praying for you and whenever you’re ready to talk or hang out, I can’t wait to spend time with you.”

A Leader’s Responsibility

As leaders, we have to understand that it’s not a burden, but it’s our responsibility to add value, encourage, and inspire others. I know it’s not always convenient or comfortable to have tough conversations.  But we can’t be self-centered and assume that someone’s attitude automatically has something to do with us as opposed to a battle they might be going through.

Don’t waste your opportunity to impact and add fuel to someone else’s fight.

Keep focusing on showing up because your life is worth competing for, no matter how beat down you are.

Let tomorrow take care of tomorrow.

Go win your day, Competitor. I’m cheering for you!