While listening to a podcast the other day it was mentioned that research has found that when someone is struggling or is needing support having an eight-minute conversation with a trusted friend that holds space with them can make all the difference in their life. This made me stop and go wow! Really only eight minutes, that is such a short interaction that it can have such an enormous impact.
Two things came to mind when pondering this theory.
One, eight minutes is such a small amount of time to ask about someone’s day, why is it so hard? Is it because something inside of us either feels or hears false statements like, “don’t reach out you will be bothering them”, “they are too busy with their lives to burden them with what is going on with you”, “you’re not worthy of their time”. Then there is not knowing if they can handle you at your worst, cause sure everyone can handle you when you have a mask on, you have made it easy for them to do that. Even asking someone to take the eight minutes is unbearably hard thing to do!
The second thing I pondered is, who is the trusted friend? Is there someone, even just one person, that you feel safe enough to take that bold step and reach out too? The word trusted is a hard and equally scary concept for most. How and who are you supposed to trust? Especially if you grew up and those who were supposed to teach you trust are the ones that in fact did the opposite and taught you to question and fear everything and everyone. Or if you have been courageous enough and put yourself out there only for that trust to be broken again and again, like it has so many times before by those that say they have your best interest at heart. Now you don’t believe that trust even exists, it's been proven trust is merely transactional. So, you sit there shoving everything, all the hurt, shame, guilt, and blame down further and further. You try not to think about it, or acknowledge it, hoping it will not continue to affect you, but the hard reality is that if you don’t process any of it then it will constantly seep up at the most inconvenient of times.
As bad as it is and as tough as it gets, we still must dust ourselves off and get back up and try again. We are not supposed to go through this life alone and afraid. We need to keep putting ourselves out there, little by little and begin to work on finding a person who means and does what they say they are going to do. Someone that is not scared to sit in the muck with you and reassure you that you are not alone. Who can be that one that you reach out to when the cross your caring gets too heavy, when your world gets dark, when your demons get to be too much for you to handle and it feels like they got the upper hand? Search because I am positive there is someone out there that would rather listen to you fall apart for eight minutes than not ever be able to have a conversation with you again.
Really, if you think about it, eight minutes is nothing! It takes longer to make dinner, get ready, or drive to the store. If someone reaches out and is willing to be open and honest with how they are doing, and what is going on, it should be thought of as an honor that someone trusts you enough to show their hurt, discouragement and/or vulnerability.
After all, it is only eight minutes, that is less than 1% of the hours in a day that can change someone’s whole outlook on life.
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