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September 27, 2022


HAVE YOU EVER SAVED ANYONE’S LIFE?

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Recently, at a birthday party, I fell into conversation with three friends and,
to my astonishment, I discovered that all three of them had saved someone's
life.

 * One had saved a child from drowning in a hotel pool.
 * One had saved her own son from choking at dinner at a restaurant.
 * One had done both—he'd saved a man from choking on a piece of bread, and
   saved a child from being swept out into the ocean.

What struck me was my friends' attitudes toward what they'd done. I expected
them to describe these stories with elation, excitement, triumph—to feel so
happy about what they'd done. I would've thought that for the rest of their
lives, they could comfort themselves with the thought, "No matter what else I
did or didn't accomplish, I saved a life."

But in fact, they seemed almost...haunted...by what had happened. I could tell
that they still felt very shaken, describing the events. They kept talking about
the near-miss, their fear of what could've happened—and even feelings of
almost-guilt, of what they would have felt if they'd failed.

I'd always assumed that it was very rare for someone to save someone's life, but
maybe it's more common than I thought. How have I never thought to ask a doctor
what it feels like to save someone's life?

Sometimes, too, people save someone's life less directly. They offer help at
just the right time, or they provide crucial information.

Sometimes, it's enough to make a simple remark: when the student is ready, the
teacher appears. A friend got out of a terribly destructive relationship when
someone said to her, "You act like he's smarter than you, that's he's more
attractive than you. But it's obvious that he's not." For whatever reason, that
comment sunk in.

Have you ever saved someone's life? Or has someone saved your life? How do you
feel about it?

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