The People Along the Way

When I was thirteen, a man on a pier told me something about catching crabs that I’ve been thinking about ever since.

He said you didn’t need much to keep them in. A cardboard box, about the size of one that would hold a case of soda, would do.

“You know why they don’t crawl out?”

I didn’t. I was thirteen. I was still working on quite a few things.

He told me that when one crab tried to climb out, the others would grab it and pull it back down.

At the time, I thought I was learning something about crabbing. It took a little more living before I started thinking about the people.

You’ve probably heard some version of the advice: surround yourself with good people. You’re the average of the five people you spend the most time with. Life is a team sport.

I don’t know about the math. But I do know the people around me have had a lot to do with who I’ve become.

The way they think. What they believe is possible. How they handle disappointment. Whether they get curious about something unfamiliar or immediately come up with twelve reasons it won’t work.

Spend enough time around that, and some of it comes home with you.

I’ve found that being around people who have qualities I’d like to develop makes me want to grow. People who are more patient, more adventurous, more generous, or a little more comfortable being themselves. People who make me think, I could probably do that, too.

And sometimes, people who believe I can do something before I’ve quite talked myself into it.

Those are good people to have around.

Over time, I’ve come to appreciate how much those relationships can expand what’s possible.

A conversation can introduce you to a career you hadn’t considered. A friend can mention your name in a room you haven’t been invited into yet. A colleague can see something in your work and give you a chance to do more.

Someone who’s already been where you’re trying to go can help you recognize a mistake before you spend three years getting very good at making it.

I appreciate that kind of efficiency more as I get older.

Sometimes the help is practical: an introduction, honest feedback, an opportunity you wouldn’t have known existed. Sometimes it’s someone asking a question that changes how you see the whole situation.

And sometimes it’s your family giving you room to try. Listening while you work through an idea. Picking up a little extra when things get busy. Reminding you who you are after a day that made you forget.

That kind of support doesn’t usually show up on a résumé. It has a lot to do with what ends up on one.

We can put in the effort ourselves, but the people around us can multiply what comes of it. Their experience adds to ours. Their perspective helps us see farther. Their confidence gives us a little courage until we develop our own.

Something that once seemed unimaginable starts to feel possible because someone we trust says, “Let’s figure it out.”

Of course, there’s the other side of that conversation on the pier.

Sometimes you start changing, and the people around you aren’t especially comfortable with it. You try something different. You get excited about a possibility. You start becoming a version of yourself they haven’t met yet.

And you feel a little tug.

It might be a joke. A dismissive comment. An explanation of why the thing you’re excited about probably isn’t going to work.

That can hurt, especially when it comes from somebody whose encouragement means something to you.

It’s tempting to decide you know exactly what’s behind it. Jealousy. Fear. Somebody wanting to keep you where you are because that’s where they’re comfortable.

Sometimes that may be true. But I’m trying to leave a little room for what I don’t know.

Change can be uncomfortable for everybody involved. Someone who loves you might be wondering where they fit in the life you’re building. And I have to leave room for the possibility that I’ve been the one doing the tugging, too.

I’d like to believe I’ve always welcomed everybody else’s growth with open arms and a big smile.

I’m probably giving myself a little too much credit.

It’s possible to be happy for someone and still have that little thought: When is it going to be my turn?

I don’t think having the thought makes us terrible. But I’m learning that somebody else getting their turn doesn’t mean mine has been canceled.

A friend’s promotion doesn’t take away my ability to grow. Someone building something wonderful doesn’t make my ideas less worthwhile. Their happiness hasn’t used up the available supply.

And when I can get out of my own head long enough to participate, I get to be part of something good.

There’s a difference, too, between wishing someone well and helping them along.

Sometimes that means making the introduction. Taking the call. Giving thoughtful feedback when it would be easier to say, “Looks great.” Speaking well of someone when they aren’t there to hear it.

Sometimes it means remembering the thing they were nervous about and asking how it went.

Those things can seem small from the giving side. From the receiving side, they can mean somebody took you seriously. Somebody remembered. Somebody thought you were worth putting their own name behind.

That stays with people.

And if it helps them get somewhere they’ve worked hard to reach, there’s a particular kind of joy in knowing you had a small part in it.

You remember when it was just an idea. You remember the doubts, the setbacks, the conversations when neither of you knew whether it would work.

Then one day it does.

That’s a pretty good thing to get to celebrate.

I think that’s part of why winning alone has never seemed quite as sweet to me. Reaching something you once thought was out of reach is wonderful. Getting to turn toward the people who helped you and say, “Can you believe this?” adds something I wouldn’t want to miss.

They know what the moment cost. They know why it matters. Sometimes they remember the beginning more clearly than you do.

The harder part, at least for me, is figuring out how to keep growing while still caring for the relationships that helped get me here. How to make room for something new without treating everything that came before it as something I needed to escape.

I don’t have a neat answer for that.

What I have learned is that people come into and out of our lives for all kinds of reasons, and plenty of those reasons are ordinary.

You stop sharing the same interests. Your lives get busy in different directions. The thing that once brought you together doesn’t occupy the same space anymore. Sometimes there’s friction you can’t seem to get past.

And sometimes you just drift.

Nobody necessarily did anything wrong. You can care about someone and still find that the lives you’re living don’t overlap the way they used to.

That took me a while to understand. I wanted there to be an explanation, something I could point to. But sometimes there’s no big falling-out to explain. There’s just more time between conversations, until eventually you realize how much has changed.

I’m learning to appreciate those relationships for what they were. We shared something. We mattered to each other. I learned something I might not have learned any other way.

I don’t think that becomes less valuable because we aren’t still talking every week.

Then there are the people who stay. Through different versions of you, different plans, and a few decisions they probably saw coming long before you did.

There’s something pretty wonderful about being known that way.

I’ve also come to believe that some lessons will keep finding me until I finally pay attention.

I’ve always liked the image of God starting with a whisper. Then comes the brick. Eventually, if I’m still determined to ignore the situation, the whole brick wall gets involved.

Apparently, I sometimes require the larger visual aid.

Looking back, I can usually recognize the whisper. At the time, I’m often busy explaining why everything is fine.

People have been part of those lessons, too. Some have shown me a way of living I wanted to move toward. Others have helped me recognize something I needed to change. A few probably taught me things they never intended to teach me.

I’m sure I’ve returned the favor.

Through all of it, I still want to keep growing. I want to stay interested in the world and present enough in my own life to notice what’s happening while it’s happening.

Because eventually, so much of what we carry is stories.

The conversations. The things we tried. The plans that went sideways. The times we laughed so hard that whatever was funny barely mattered anymore.

The good news we couldn’t wait to share. The good news somebody couldn’t wait to share with us.

And when I think about those stories, there are people in almost every one.

Some are still close. Some I haven’t seen in years. Some shared a long stretch of my life, and others were there for a brief moment that somehow stayed with me.

Like a man on a pier explaining crabs to a thirteen-year-old kid.

I doubt he imagined I’d still be thinking about that conversation all these years later. He was probably just telling me how to keep the crabs in the box.

But that’s the funny thing about the people we meet. We don’t always know what we’ll carry away from them—or what they’ll carry away from us.

I’m certainly no expert at any of this. I’m still figuring out when to hold on, when to give someone room, and how to be useful to the people I care about while we’re all trying to find our way.

But I can’t imagine my life without the people who’ve been part of it. All the ins and outs, the ups and downs, the growth, the pain, and the joy.

And if something happens tomorrow that I once wouldn’t have believed possible, I already know part of what will make it wonderful.

I’ll have people I can’t wait to call.