It Doesn't Take Much...

I say it over and over, and I get tired of defending the position, and it's not humility, it's not deflection. It's the truth...It doesn't take much.  It simply doesn't take all that much to change a life...show up...be sincere...believe...trust...pay attention...value perspectives...laugh...support...share...work together...embrace equality...be fallible...be kind...be patient. Be yourself.

This week I met a girl who had been robbed of everything...everything, an unfathomable degree of degradation, but worse...hope...faith...trust...innocence. Everyone who met her fell apart from her story...watched her fall apart all over again in front of their eyes...until eventually all of those everyones called me all on the same day and asked if I could help.  Of course, I could try.

We met today...and we laughed...and we cut some chains...and we found some hope and stumbled on some faith...and no one cried.  She smiled a lot, and it was a wonderful smile.  She needed a lot of things but some of them were very simple...winter clothes...food...help with the red tape...and some were more difficult, confidence...value...acceptance...privacy...dignity...but we found those too.  She didn't break my heart at all, not like she did the rest, but instead I found her mending pieces of my own as she tried to do the same.  She lifted me up and I couldn't help but tell her what she was doing...at first she didn't believe it, but I don't hide excitement and enthusiasm and emotions very well.  She could see it on my face.  When I told her, "you've got this...everything's going to be okay.  I'll help," she finally looked like maybe she believed someone.  It was easy because I believed it.

Most of us don't need much...a friend...a chance...a breath...a break...a time to lose our minds and a place to fall apart and pick ourselves back up in privacy.  Most of us just need the world to slow down for a minute, just long enough to match their pace and allow them to pick it's rhythms back up and start running again.  Most of us just need someone else to remind them that it doesn't take much.

Believe me when I tell you...it doesn't take much.