Most of us don’t remember much before the age of five or six. The years that have the greatest impact on us are the years that are most difficult for us to access.
But a childhood full of love left its mark. Not in memory, but in reflection. The way someone behaves the day after asking for help, receiving a compliment, or having an argument. I began to believe these little stories more than people talked about their experiences growing up.
Here are five that I see often.
1. They ask for help but don’t get upset about it
A friend of mine recently texted me: “Can you look at this contract? Take your time.” No apology, no three paragraphs of preamble to explain how much he hates bothering me. Just asking.
I know other people who would rather drown quietly than send this text. They’ll be dealing with everything on their own for months, and it sucks.
Those who are prone to asking questions have learned something before they can speak. When they call, someone always shows up, so needing something never becomes a shame. It’s still no shame for them.
On the other hand, they also tend to be generous. When the help was never a debt to your family, it won’t feel like one in any way.
2. When something goes wrong, they pick up the phone
Think about the last time really bad news hit you. Jobs fall through, cars are totaled, relationships end. What did you do in the first hour?
Some people become silent after a few weeks, when everything is said and done and there is nothing left to comfort them. Others call someone almost immediately. Not for solutions. Just to shout it out to someone who cares.
The second instinct belongs to those who find comfort rather than admonishment in their bad days. The hassle of sharing becomes smaller every time, so sharing becomes automatic. Like a language learned at a young age, it never completely disappears.
3. Differences of opinion are not dangerous to them
Some people might have an argument on Tuesday and have a perfectly normal breakfast on Wednesday. There are no days of fear afterwards, no crazy over-the-top apologies, and no quiet certainty that the relationship is now damaged. Conflict occurs and is over, but life must go on. I used to be surprised by people like this. It seemed almost careless, how little a fight cost them.
Then I noticed where they tended to come from. At home, people can be openly angry at each other, but dinner still happens. No one got frozen for a week for talking loudly. Love stays in the room during the fight, so the fight never ends.
4. Unprovoked phone calls
My wife often calls her family in Vietnam. There was never an agenda. Twenty minutes about food, the weather, her cousin’s new job and the plants her mom is growing. Then she hung up the phone and would probably hang up again tomorrow.
Observations over the years have shown me what a relaxed relationship with my parents actually looks like. Looks boring. This relationship requires no occasion because it is never conditional on anything.
You can’t pretend you want to talk to your parents. People either send pictures of the bird, ask questions about faucet repair that they can google, or call on Tuesday for no reason, or they don’t. Those who do are almost always happy to hear it long before they remember it.
5. They get people to treat them well
A friend was sick, and someone brought him soup.
Watch carefully, because there are two completely different ways to receive the soup. A person apologizes for the trouble they caused, insists it was not necessary, and then opens a tab in their mind that they will feel anxious about it until it is repaid. The other said thank you for being a good friend and ate the soup.
Praise works the same way. Deflect and argue with it, or just accept it.
Those who can receive the warmth without squirming are usually given one free of charge, without a scoreboard. They don’t doubt good intentions because good intentions are never a joke to them.
If you find yourself in most of these, someone did a lot of the quiet work for you long ago, before you formed a single memory.
If you don’t, these responses won’t develop by age five. I’ve seen people slowly learn these as adults, mostly by spending time with people who already have them. It just takes longer the second time.
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