The higher calling is to affirm importance of others in our lives

I coach first-year M.B.A. students in leadership at a top-rated Philadelphia school of business. Recently, I received a brief e-mail acknowledging my previous thank you. It came from Colleen, the leader of my coaching team, and read, "You are an important and loved person among us, Lonnie."

That should have been that, but her brief sentence has stayed with me for weeks. Important and loved. As legacies go, are there any two qualities more desirable than these?

I think of the newly retired former employee who is awakened that first Monday by the alarm clock he forgot to reprogram. He hops out of bed and begins his trek to the bathroom before he realizes that he does not have to be at work today. No one is expecting him. No one would be in the least concerned if he failed to arrive. He is no longer important.

Importance is essential to self-esteem. It is the soul of human dignity, the meaning of leaving one's mark. "Attention must be paid," cries the dead salesman's wife; no man is so low that his life has no importance.

We assign importance to a person for various reasons: inventive genius, great talent, steadfast commitment, or outsized accomplishment. It taps reservoirs of deep intellect, fierce courage, startling creativity, singular beauty, or some combination of these. Nothing, it seems, is more important than being important, leaving a mark.

Unless it is being loved. Being missed when I do not show up; being welcomed warmly when I do. Every time I visit my grandkids, they have a habit of running at me screaming wildly. It is by far my favorite love song, sung in three-part cacophony, and they sing it even when I forget to bring a gift along.

Then there was the tiny squeeze my wife gave my outstretched hand when she awoke from surgery, the silent song that let me know she loved me enough to return to me.

Public figures - actors, politicians, preachers, moguls, and their like - are often considered important, but the rarer accolade, the one that we don't assign too glibly, is "beloved." Make your own list of well-knowns and see what you think. Consider Julie Andrews, Donald Trump, the Dalai Lama, Miley Cyrus, Vladimir Putin, Maya Angelou, Pope Francis. Are they just celebrities of passing interest? Or are they important? Are they loved?

One who may be both, Pope Francis, has caused an unprecedented stir by running around shouting about the importance of ragged refugees, prison inmates, and single moms, asserting the they must not be marginalized, that attention must be paid. He has also sought out the disabled, the unpretty, the least among us, and embraced them with shameless love.

At some level all of us need to feel we live lives of significance, importance. Within our nation, our community, our company, or our family, we must make a difference that is acknowledged and smiled at. Likewise, we need someone important to us to love us, to want us around, to smile not just at our impact but at our presence.

In the work world, the great leaders I've consulted with certainly get it. Some leaders find myriad ways to tell their followers how important they are, how needed, how critical are their talents and experience to overall success. Other leaders convince their people that they are not only appreciated but cared about - loved, if you will. Some few leaders manage to transmit both.

Our higher calling, then, is not to be important, not to earn the medal or win the Oscar, much as we all need such indicators of significance. The higher calling is to affirm the importance of others, whether as parents telling our kids how capable and worthy they are, or as friends telling our BFFs how much they bring to our lives.

Perhaps the highest calling of all, though, is letting our loved ones know they are loved. We don't need to scream wildly when they show up, as my grandkids do, though there's nothing wrong with that. A squeeze of the hand will suffice, a "really glad to see you," an exclamation of joy when good things happen to them, a hug of sympathy when sadness visits.

Or maybe a little e-mail that tells them they are important and loved. Thanks, Colleen.