Last week, an email landed in my inbox that made me blink a few times.

It came from a leader, educator, and well-respected speaker whom I value deeply in the education space and beyond. I am not going to share who it is just yet because the book this wonderful person is preparing to release is not mine to announce. But what I do want to share is what the invitation caused me to think about: the impact we have on one another, especially the impact we don’t always see.

As I wrote in my book The Leader Inside, there are people who are placed along our paths and serve as lanterns, helping to illuminate the way. Some people enter our lives for a moment. Others remain for days, months, years, or even decades. Some stay, while others are not meant to. Sometimes the reason for their presence or their departure is not apparent in the moment. We may only understand its significance much later. 

In The Pivot Year, Brianna Wiest captures this idea beautifully: “The people, places and things that phase in and out of your life come to you for a specific purpose, and once their mission is complete, you were able to move into the next experience.”

I return to that idea often because we do not always recognize what another person was meant to teach us while we are living through the experience. And perhaps what we recognize even less often is what we may have been teaching them, too.

So, with joy in my heart and a great deal of gratitude, I accepted the invitation to read this person’s upcoming book and provide an endorsement.

As I write this, I have gotten a later start to my Saturday than usual. I am typically an early riser. I like to get my workout in, make my coffee, and read in the quiet before the responsibilities of the day begin to unfold.

This particular Saturday morning, I spent that quiet time reading the words of this wonderful author.

I read every word carefully. As I often do, I opened the Notes app on my phone and began jotting down the ideas that resonated with me. I knew those notes would eventually help me craft an endorsement that I not only believed in, but one I hoped the author would be proud to have attached to the work they are bringing into the world.

As I read, I could feel the intention behind every page. The writer had taken the time to bring together heart, mind, research, and thoughtful reflection in a way that could resonate with educators, leaders, organizations, and those far beyond the education space. The words made complex ideas feel accessible, actionable, and deeply human. There were also moments when I found myself rereading a passage, challenged to think more carefully about the ideas and how they applied to my own context. I appreciate that kind of reading, the kind that feels comfortable enough to digest, yet challenging enough to push my thinking and help me understand more.

At times, it felt as though the author were speaking directly to me. And then something happened that I was not expecting.

I saw my name.

When I read, my eyes have a habit of wandering ahead on the page before I have quite finished the section in front of me. Does that ever happen to you? Sometimes I wonder if I am simply eager to see what is coming next or if I need to remind myself to slow down and stay with the words in front of me.

This time, though, my eyes landed somewhere unexpected.

They landed on a passage I had written in my book The Leader Inside, which the author had also generously endorsed.

There is something difficult to describe about seeing your own words reflected back to you in someone else’s work. You write something from your own experiences and thinking, send it out into the world, and often have no idea where it lands or what someone else may carry with them.

The response it triggered surprised me.

Tears filled my eyes. There were tears because this was someone who had taken time out of their own days to mentor me, coach me, challenge me, show up for me when I was presenting at a conference years ago, and guide me throughout different parts of my career. I have interacted with, observed, and learned so much from this person as a leader, writer, content creator, and human being.

And yet, there on the page, was evidence of something I had never fully considered:

While this person had been helping me, perhaps I had been helping them, too.

That was the impact I had not seen.

Because perhaps that is one of the most beautiful things about the relationships we build throughout our lives. We may never fully know what another person carries with them because of knowing us. 

We may think someone is mentoring us without realizing we are influencing them, too.
We may think someone is teaching us without recognizing they are learning from us, too.
We may see the gifts in someone else without realizing they may be seeing gifts in us, too.

That is the reciprocal nature of being human.

In The Leader Inside, I write about the gifts within us waiting to be unwrapped at the right place, at the right time, and with the right people. Increasingly, I think part of our responsibility is to help one another unwrap those gifts.

To notice them.
To name them.
To create opportunities for them to grow.

I am grateful for both the favorable and unfavorable learning experiences I have encountered throughout my life because each one has contributed to the leader, educator, and human being I am today and the person I am still becoming.

You never know when the person who is helping you is also being helped by you.

That is the impact we don’t always see.

We do not always get to see the evidence of our impact. Most of the time, there is no book waiting to surprise us with our name on a page. There is no announcement telling us that something we said mattered. Often, we simply have to trust that the way we show up with generosity, curiosity, hope, and care leaves something behind.

And perhaps that is what makes the relationships we have yet to discover so exciting, too. There are people we have not even met yet who will become part of our story. People who will challenge us, encourage us, cheer us on, and help us become more fully ourselves. And somewhere along the way, we may do the same for them.

Last week, an unexpected email landed in my inbox.

This Saturday morning, I realized that the real surprise was not the invitation to read a book.

It was being reminded of the impact we don’t always see…the light we leave along someone else’s path while they are busy illuminating ours.