The Power of Buffer (in Life)

It was a normal day in the office and I was carrying a mug full of hot tea to my desk. I just made the mistake of holding the mug not by its handle but by its sides. Actually I made two more mistakes at the same time – 1) thinking that the mug won’t burn my fingers over the short distance from the tea-kitchen to my desk, 2) not keeping my other hand free in case it did. Anyway, I was about to risk scalding my skin and damaging company property by letting the mug go, when an empty desk saved me. No colleague was using it, so I put down the mug in a hurry on to it, blew gently on my fingers and grabbed the mug again by the handle. Later, I discovered a profound lesson in this mundane incident.

If you think about it, the table didn’t directly solve my problem, i.e. making the mug less warm or my skin more impervious to hot surfaces but it acted as a buffer long enough for me to find a way to handle the problem. And sometimes when people are in trouble, they don’t necessarily need the complete and permanent solution to their problem but just a little buffer to enable them to solve the problem themselves. For example, if someone was drowning, you don’t necessarily have to rescue them. No, if you just gave them enough support for enough time to find their bearing, they might find the strength (out of their panic) to save themselves. Or maybe they can save themselves long enough to find another buffer which helps them survive just a bit more and so on until they are completely out of the water. I guess, that’s why they say “grasping at straws” because one straw might not save you but it might act as a buffer long enough to find another straw which helps you to yet another straw and so on. This lesson is especially useful when helping someone out financially. Consider this example from Dame Stephanie Shirley, one of the greatest female Entrepreneurs of the digital era.

Ms Shirley’s nascent company that developed computer algorithms and software was in a dire financial state. It was about to go under but someone provided a loan. The loan acted as a buffer for the company to get out the hole and eventually do well enough to become one of the leading companies in computer software!

Next time you get a chance to help someone in need, don’t think “what can my little contribution do!” Every little counts. You never know what little contribution of yours becomes that one straw in the series of straws that save someone drowning, at least long enough for them to save themselves. And to be honest, that’s what help is all about. It’s not about solving someone’s problem, it’s about supporting them for just that little bit long enough for them to stand on their own feet. For me, that’s the gist of help (both giving and taking) and that’s the power of buffer.