Leveraging the power of friendship

​There is "don't worry, you'll figure it out."

And there is "don't worry, I'll figure this out for you."

But maybe the most powerful - even if often overlooked - is "don't worry, we'll figure it out together."

Last night, I had the opportunity to speak to a group of people working to figure it out together in the Circles Ashland program. The program matches people struggling through poverty with friends who are willing to share their friends and time and personal resources to help them work their way out of it.

Circles Ashland leverages the power of friendship.

As I was getting ready to speak, I looked around the room at a group of people sharing dinner together. People who are struggling eating with people wanting to help someone work their way through a struggle.

Often we talk about certain foods and drinks that pair well together at dinner. But I found myself feeling like the perfect dinner pairing might be the struggling and the helping. Because at this dinner, the smiles made it impossible to distinguish which was which.

After dinner, my friend Christie led them through a moment where anyone who wanted to could stand up and share something "good or new" that was happening in their lives. A young man stood up and let everyone know he'd just registered for classes at a local community college.

The world made a big deal about some guy who bought Twitter this week. I found myself wishing that the world looking for a big deal could see this kid's face.

The title of my talk was "Life is a We Thing." I told the group that title isn't just a feel good slogan that fits well into a community conversation - it's science. But as I was talking to them, I was reminded that sometimes science is something we can feel good about.

Sometimes the truth really is a feel good story.

WE are meant to WEather life together. It's our design. It's the common plot threaded intimately through all of our stories. When our lives get to feeling void of intimacy - that's the thread we are missing - our WE thread.

That's the thread that is broken.

The beautiful thing about life - that broken thread isn't a disappearing thread. It's there. It's looking for attachment.

It's looking for a room full of the struggling and the helping. It's looking for the connection that makes recognizing the difference between the two impossible. And irrelevant.

Because that thread is a bridge we share, not one we cross.

That bridge is life.

It is love.