A couple of days back, a group of individuals who are part of a communication & presentation skills club invited me as a guest speaker. I spent sometime with them sharing a few tips and experiences. Later on, few of the club representatives came to me and shared the participants’ feedback. What they did left me speechless. They collated the feedback, made a collage and gave me (see the picture below). This gesture made me feel so special – it made my day. True…appreciation is so powerful!
This reminded me of an incident that happened when I was in school. During our farewell, one of our teachers said “Teaching is so fulfilling. In my life, I accomplished a lot of things that many consider difficult. However, I never felt proud of my achievements. But, a couple of years back, there was a lot of political unrest in the city. This had a negative impact on the number of working days in our school. As a result, I could not complete the topics that I wanted to cover. On the last day of that academic year, I was talking to my colleague and expressed my disappointment over this. Just then, somebody tapped on my shoulder. When I turned around, I saw one of the final year students standing. He looked at me, held my hands and said – Sir, despite the fact that there were so many disturbances, you still did a wonderful job in teaching all the important things to us and I came to thank you for that.” I could see tears in the eyes of my teacher as he continued “I was speechless hearing that.”
At that moment, I didn’t understand what was such a big deal about it. I now understand the importance of showing gratitude and appreciation. I guess wisdom and age are the combo deal that God gave me.
When we genuinely appreciate and thank someone, we tend to make that person feel valued and happy. And that feeling is contagious…so, a win-win!
Unfortunately, appreciating someone doesn’t come easily to me – but I’m trying, learning from my wife.
If you don’t do it often, then you should try as well. It really feels good.
How are you at genuinely appreciating someone?
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