By Dan Klein – CEO, Sage Marketing

Last week we lost Anthony Bourdain way too early. I have watched his shows through the years, and even met him once randomly on a street corner in Manhattan.  For those of you who don’t know, I have a habit of meeting people in my travels and yes, I do judge them on how friendly they are in person. Anthony was a pleasure to speak with and how he took a few moments to have a quick conversation with me speaks to how much of a regular guy he really was (and didn’t just appear to be on his programs). It’s a real tragedy to lose someone so talented, and in this way. I will always remember his lessons on how food can create common ground in bringing people from all different cultures together.

Life would be so much easier if we all just carried a little notebook with us and when we meet people we could just give them a copy and say “Here’s all the stuff I’m dealing with right now”. When someone breaks a bone it’s easy to spot because they’re wearing a cast. Intuitively you wouldn’t ask someone with a broken leg to start jumping. Mental illness is just as debilitating, you just can’t see it because there’s no cast and the scars are on the inside.

Remember that sometimes people you encounter throughout the day have some pretty big stuff going on under the surface. You just don’t know it. One rule I try to follow is that when I think I’ve figured out someone or what they’re dealing with – I’m probably wrong. It’s one thing to sympathize with someone, it’s another thing entirely to experience things from their perspective. Mental illness is the storm that no one but the person experiencing it can see.

Let go of trying to fix things. In our fast-moving culture full of super speedy results and social media envy it’s easy to fall into wanting to try and solve a problem for someone with good intentions.  By pushing someone in a direction there may be more harm done than good. It’s important to be supportive and sometimes that means being there for someone to listen in a situation that you just can’t fix.

A little compassion goes a long way. Understanding that someone may be struggling and there’s nothing you can do about it may feel like a very difficult thing. Mental illness isn’t logical, it doesn’t play by normal rules, and most times it doesn’t appear to make any sense to an outsider. If you see someone struggling, try and steer them to someone who can help, and be ok if that person isn’t you. If someone mentions or tells you they are thinking of harming themselves, call 800-273-TALK.

I have encountered mental illness around me. It took my nephew David a few years ago and I miss him every day and would give anything just to talk with him one more time.

I run a marketing company so why the heck would I be writing about this you ask? Well, there’s no business advice in this article, sorry about that. Caring about people is the most important thing any of us can do. If you can show compassion to help one person who is struggling after reading this article then my job is done. Thanks for taking a few minutes to read this.