When you care enough to send the very best, you send Hallmark. Of course you do. Hallmark’s current slogan was born in 1944, jotted down by a sales executive on a 3×5 notecard and capturing all the company wanted to convey– care, quality, excellence. When used as a noun, “care” connotes desire, concern, personal interest, esteem, and regard. But if used as a verb it is about taking action—demonstrating care in a way that shows you hold others dear, you prize and protect them, you nurture and nurse, you mother and you minister. Caring thoughts are great, but caring acts change lives and change the world.
I learned only too clearly and personally about the word care back in 1989. Chris and I had just finished building our dream home. I wrote about it in my book Come Home Alive:
“We were standing outside of the walk-in closet of our new home—a home we had moved into just weeks before. We were having a very intense argument about the state of my closet. In Chris’s mind’s eye it was in extreme disarray. ‘Your closet is a mess. Here we have this beautiful new home, and you treat it like this! There are dry cleaner bags everywhere. Your shoes are in a pile. Look at my side. It’s well taken care of. Everything is in its place. You just don’t care’, exclaimed Chris.”
Care is Demonstrated in How We Operate
It would be almost a year later, while sitting in front of Kathy Kolbe learning about my personal mode of operating, based on my Kolbe A™ index (4 2 9 4), that I realized how true Chris’s words were:
“As a 2 in Follow Thru, I prevented and resisted keeping things neat, tidy, and in place. I resisted completing one thing at a time. I had great difficulty keeping anything in perfect order. I didn’t need it that way, and so I didn’t put striving energy into those efforts. But Chris absolutely needed it. What crystallized in that moment was that I did not care about what was important to my husband…I did care, but now I could see that I did not demonstrate actions around those things that were vitally important to him. So, in his mind, I did not care, and he was absolutely right.”
Those were tough words to write and are tougher still to read now, 35 years after what we have referred to as a Big Life Day. Our Kolbe MOs determine where we will use our time, and where we will put our energy. Some of us may go through “chronic partial engagement” in life, when we are trying to care for so many things at once that we perform flybys and only engage on a surface level. Take the time to unearth what is important to those you care about— people for whom you have personal regard, love, and esteem. Really dig deep, watch, and observe where they put energy because that is what is important to them. For 35 years now, I have known that order is important to Chris. During some tough cancer years, it was important always for us to have order in our home, in our lives, and in our schedules. I worked at creating an environment that mirrored his innate needs. It was not easy and required uncomfortable discipline.
Tools to Support Conversations About Happiness and Satisfaction
Here is a great way to start a conversation around your own priorities—consider the seven Fs.
These are seven key elements we all have in common that bring satisfaction in life:
- Faith
- Family
- Finances
- Fitness
- Friends
- Fun
- Future
Think about what your spouse or children would put first, then second and so on. And then you. What order you might choose? Have a purposeful discussion around your choices.
Another list I have found helpful is Gretchen Rubin’s “Essential 7 Habits to Foster Happiness,” from her book Better Than Before:
- Eat and drink more healthfully
- Exercise regularly
- Save, spend, and earn wisely
- Rest, relax and enjoy
- Accomplish more, stop procrastinating
- Simplify, clear, clean, and organize
- Engage more deeply in relationships—with other people, with God, with the world
Both of these approaches offer a tool or foundation to have difficult conversations about what truly is important to the other person and how to begin to engage in meaningful, caring action to support those needs.
Demonstrate Care Continuously
Simon Sinek, leadership guru and author of Start With Why says, “Leadership is not about being in charge. Leadership is about taking care of those in your charge.” Good leaders find a way to make things better for more people. Good leaders generate hope. That’s not always easy because hope requires action. It’s those repeated actions repeated over time that demonstrate your deep care.
November is National Family Caregiving Month. I write this to honor all those who personally care for others. Acknowledge a caregiver in your life. Send a card to your local hospice organization thanking them for all they do. Write a personal note to someone you know who has been absorbed in doing all that’s required as their loved one agonizingly slips away. Or perhaps engage in uncomfortable discipline by using your time and your energy to demonstrate your care for not what is important to you, but what is important to others.
Mari D. Martin is the author of Come Home Alive—The Power of Knowing how to Work Together to Make it Through the Crisis of Cancer. It is a book that celebrates caregivers. It tells how Mari’s role as a caregiver was to stay true to herself, while also being the hands and feet to recognize, minimize and complete the tasks and requirements Chris naturally resisted on his journey to come home alive. Click below to learn more about Chris and Mari’s care journey.