adminZachary Aldwin Milkshake in the Boardroom
When I was still at school one of the teachers stopped me one day and asked how I was doing. It was a cold and miserable day and I was walking past the chapel in the afternoon seeking somewhere warmer to study.
The cloudy weather mirrored my tortured teenage soul, I had suffered a recent family bereavement and was holding my books close to my chest and feeling rotten inside.
A voice called my name and I looked up to see the rather squat shape of Mr T staring at me from the top of the chapel steps.
I approached him apprehensively (you can never be too sure what a teacher may end up asking you to do when they call you over). My apprehension was unfounded. He asked how I was doing, not in a cliché type of conversation but out of a genuine care for my well being.
He asked how I was coping with my loss. He offered advice. The whole exchange took less than five minutes but I left feeling better and carried a sense of “someone has my back” with me until he left the school for another post. His intervention was unnecessary. It was unnecessary in that he did not have to go out of his way to counsel a grieving teenager, I was not even in any of his classes at the time. He could have passed by yet he took time to talk to me to make me feel better.
Those five minutes left an indelible positive mark in my soul; through the entire grieving episode he was the only teacher who ever asked how I was coping. His gesture was a “Pay it Forward”.
The concept of “Pay it Forward” was highlighted in the book and movie of the same name. In a nutshell it involves doing an unsolicited act of kindness for someone with the sole caveat that instead of returning the favour to them they pass it on to one or more people.
Random acts of spontaneous kindness have filtered through talk shows, blogs and magazines for years; encouraging people to be better and think less of themselves.
In my naivety I used to wonder why people needed to be reminded to be kind; surely it was common sense that if everyone treated others with dignity, respect and really “did unto others as they would have done unto them” the world would just be a better and happier place.
Then I grew up. People are not, as a rule, naturally kind. Watch any reality show that puts on competitive pressure and even the most pleasant of individuals can deteriorate to self-serving behaviour.
We need to be reminded, frequently, to lift up our heads above our own little life and consider the needs of others and do things that are probably unnecessary in our lives.
Unnecessary things are inconvenient for the giver. Going out of your way to take someone home at night is inconvenient.
Unnecessary things can seem rather illogical to observers. Giving something away to someone when you are trying to save money is illogical.
Unnecessary things elicit a response from the recipient that goes something like “Oh but you didn’t have to . . .” and with it is this underlying sense of gratitude. Strangely it is not the gratitude that makes you feel like you have done something special, but simply the act of doing that makes you feel warm inside.
When someone says, “That was unnecessary,” then rest assured, you probably did the right thing.
As with most things that appear off-the-cuff the “spontaneity” part of unnecessary things comes from planning.
You have to intentionally make doing such things part of your life until such a time as it becomes second nature.
Some acts require a little more planning than others (taking a basket of groceries round to an elderly neighbour, or ordering flowers for someone). At the very least, opening your mind to idea of being unnecessary makes you more sensitive to the situations that you come across that you would usually pass by.
The guys at Emerging Ideas came up with a list of some unnecessary things: You don’t have to communicate where you are and that you’re thinking about someone.
You don’t have to pay to park and come back inside just to see your friend off at the airport. You don’t have to re-file all of the paperwork from your company’s past bids and quotes, so they’re easy to find.
You don’t have to encourage a colleague when they’re having a rough day. You don’t have to listen to a young entrepreneur’s idea. You don’t have introduce two friends who have similar business interests.
All of these things are completely and entirely unnecessary. And yet, unnecessary things win people over. They may make moments a little wacky and often memorable. It’s interesting, when you do the unnecessary; you often become just the opposite. Necessary people do unnecessary things; do one today.
Online Reporter