Over the past few years, I’ve made several visits to friends and family members in the hospital for various reasons. Visiting them has brought up all sorts of feelings, including sadness, concern, fear, frustration that bad things happen to good people, as well as worry thoughts about their recovery and hopeful thoughts that they’ll recover well. This experience also has brought to mind how much I take people for granted. I think we all do. It’s easy to act like the people in our lives will always be around and will be OK. When we do that, it’s easy to forget how much we care about them and how important they are. They become a little like furniture. We take for granted that our sofa will be there when we want to relax in the evening after a long day, but we don’t really step back and reflect on how wonderful it is that it is actually there. I don’t think I realized how much I valued and cared about the folks I was visiting in the hospital until adversity struck and it dawned on me how important they were to me. This brought to mind a couple of important DBT skills that we teach our clients. First, I thought of the skill of “contributing,” which is a distress tolerance skill that can help people ride out negative emotions. The skill works because contributing involves focusing on other peoples’ needs (giving us a temporary break from focusing on our emotional pain), and because giving to others can boost your mood. Even though visiting someone in the hospital is something anyone would do (it’s not like you’re some kind of saint for doing it), I noticed a warm sense of fulfillment just giving my time to others when they were having a really difficult time. Contributing doesn’t have to be a skill that you just use when you’re really distressed; it can be an everyday practice. I think that regular, small acts like opening the door for someone, saying “Hello” and expressing interest in someone else’s day/life, giving a nice tip when you get takeout food, giving your dog a belly rub, and so forth, can not only enhance your mood but help improve others’ lives. The second skill that came to mind, and the one that almost always comes to mind, is mindfulness. It’s harder to take others for granted when we’re mindfully present with them. Thich Nhat Hanh, Rumi, and others have described mindful presence as an incredible gift we can give to others. The idea is to treat the person (or animal, pet, etc.) as the most important person in the world. Give them your full attention. Drop the smart phone, convey interest, really listen to what they have to say, and be fully present. Act as if you will only have limited opportunities to be with this person (which is ultimately true). You might find that you take them for granted a little less and start really treasuring your time together. ~ Alexander L. Chapman Ph.D, R.Psych.