If you’re like me, you struggle with providing empathy to others. In part, I think I struggle with it because I detest the entitlement — everybody-wins-a-trophy — mindset. And when I see anything that begins to resemble aspects of that, I quickly retreat the other way.

So when I hear people struggle with daily life — occurrences that almost everyone deals with — it rarely affects me. If anything, I become a little jaded.

However, today’s Scripture challenges me to look beyond myself, to see others’ needs ahead of my own, to be present in the moment, and to be a loving ear to listen or a shoulder to cry on, should the situation warrant that.

Bottom line: Though everyone is in process in this life journey, your experiences, your maturity, your loving example can benefit others. As no one is an island, then we were meant for community.

As a good teammate both in life and in competition, we are stronger together; though cliché, we really are only as strong as our weakest link.

By celebrating with others and sharing in others’ sorrows, you humanize the human experience. When you refresh others, you find that you too will be refreshed.

Be willing to be vulnerable. And be willing to be present.

Athlete, you weren’t meant to do life alone.