RELAY RACING
“How are you doing” I ask the young woman standing in the cold checking us on to a ferry from Hull to Rotterdam. It’s day one of a ten day road trip that Liz and I are making to Denmark.
“I’m OK” she says. “At least it’s not raining today. I’ve been doing this job in the rain all week. But thanks for asking. And enjoy your holiday”.
And so on we go. On, to the ferry, and beyond.
We meet the Filipino team (six months on, six months off) in the boat’s restaurant who entertain us with impromptu music (and their smiles).
The Danish lady who helps us unravel the mysteries of paying to park the car in Aarhus (my theory – you had to be Danish).
The German driver who lowers his window as we are both stuck in traffic in Hamburg, exchanges a few cheery words, and waves us through before him.
The people who take the time to show us where the nearest ATM is, how to buy a rail ticket, where to rent bikes, or who open up that lovely room in the City Hall that isn’t usually open on a Monday morning “but I’m happy to open it up just for you”.
I think of these people as all having been in a relay race of which they had no knowledge. They were passing us along the line from one to another. They didn’t know each other, they didn’t know where we were going. They just did it because it was part of their essential humanity. And we were the beneficiaries.
Maybe they benefited too. Maybe they felt good about helping us, the strangers in their midst.
I read an interview this weekend with a leader whom I coached many years ago. He’s doing well, I was pleased to see. There will have been others before and since. Without us, in all probability he is not where he is today. But with us, and more in the future, on he goes.
Very often, in fact perhaps most of the time, we don’t get to see the impact we have on other’s relay races. And there’s no guarantee that we will be remembered for the part we played. That’s not part of the deal.
But the lesson for us all, surely, whether we are talking workplace or elsewhere, is that by sharing our knowledge (how to park the car in Aarhus), our gifts (playing music on the boat) or just our essential humanity (letting someone go first in the traffic jam) we help make the world a better place.
Sure, there’s big stuff that some of us get to do. But there’s small stuff as well. People of faith might call this the Kingdom of God. I would.
So let’s take the time to pause and acknowledge when others are helping us, however trivially, and let’s do the same for them. Bottom line - we’re all in a whole stack of relay races, and we surely all need help!
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