I’ve had a number of influential coaches in my life. They range from the traditional, such as my track and cross country coaches, to the more obscure, like a bow-legged old-school cowboy who also happened to be a thoroughbred jockey in the ‘50s, later turned truck driver and competitive roller-skater.

It includes two high school teachers – my language and composition teacher, who retained a slight twang from her southern roots, and my Spanish teacher, a self-professed tree hugger who had been a Peace Corps volunteer in Chile during the ‘70s.

There’s also several I discovered in college: a towering horse trainer from Pakistan known for several signature phrases, a freshman year professor elected into the National Academy of Medicine, a gentle academic advisor, a trail-blazing internship supervisor and most recently, a bubbly career coach I met as a now-alum of my alma mater.

I’m a firm believer of people (and opportunities) coming into, or leaving, my life for a reason. I don’t always like the reason, and sometimes I don’t see the reason until years later. Other times, I meet someone and know within a few minutes that this person’s probably going to teach me a lot more than they are ever aware of if I stick around.

I don’t mean to say that manipulatively… As if I just find someone on the street and decide to use them for my own gains. In a positive context, it’s about learning to receive that which you may not be able to return. In the negative, it’s learning to feel some degree of failure and deciding for yourself if it’s worth dwelling on or finding the strength to grow from.

All of the ‘coaches’ I listed above are overall positives. For the longest time I have felt a conflicting guilt over not doing enough to show my appreciation to these people, and then realizing that usually, they were just doing their job. I tend to avoid having people go out of their way for me if at all possible, because if they do, I feel indebted to them. This is likely not helped by the fact that of the 10 people included in my above list, two have since passed away, and in both cases I didn’t feel like I had properly told them “thank you.” The first was that bow-legged cowboy I mentioned.

I was basically a working student for Bobby, a barely 5 foot tall 69 year-old who had retained all the old horseman's tricks, along with an impressively colorful vocabulary and equally impressive cigarette habit. For 2 ½ years I was riding anywhere from 45 minutes – 3 hours, 5-6 days a week during the summer, and only slightly less during the school year. A majority of this was with Deedee (in the picture above with Bobby at our first show in the summer of '08), because after seeing me ride for the first time I got the following evaluation: “Well… you need a lot of work. I mean, a lot. But if you’re willing to put the time in, maybe we can get you riding.”**

**I promise I'm not quoting a budget "horsegirl" movie from the '90s or early 2000s, for all you equestrians out there.

Eventually I put in enough work to help with two of his other young horses, and even got a few rides on the dainty Connie. Investing that kind of time in me, without asking anything in return, is the only reason I progressed as much as I did as a rider, the only way I was able to get show experience before college, and the only circumstance under which I was able to keep my own horse for as long as I did. I thanked him frequently, honestly, and sincerely; he told me he recognized my appreciation and that he was enjoying the ride, but after being diagnosed with pancreatic cancer in the winter of ’08-’09, his visits from the house to the barn steadily decreased in frequency. I didn’t get to tell him thank you so often, but dutifully had a parent drive me out because I had promised I would keep his horses in shape for him. As winter turned to spring and summer however, I wasn’t going out to the barn so often either, due to a number of circumstances compiling at once.

Next October, it will be 10 years since he passed away. As sad as it is, I don’t actually remember the last time I saw him. It was probably late summer and a good two or three months before he passed, and I certainly didn’t expect it to be goodbye. It gnawed at me until just recently that I didn’t get to return any of what he gave to me, or say a proper goodbye. I’m only finally accepting something I already knew; just accept the damn gift. I hope both he and his wife know how much they and their horses meant to me. Countless times I’ve advised or helped someone with something, and they ask what they can do in return. Like Bobby, I don’t want anything unless that was the original agreement; let me give, and you receive. We forget that people need the choice to give because they aren’t always able; they need to be needed for the sake of themselves. Likewise, they need the humility to receive help that can’t be reciprocated. We accept it, make the most of it, and then our own chance to give will come again soon enough. It’s not about keeping score or needing a certain ratio of giving/receiving.

It’s about saying thank you, and knowing that is enough. You don’t have to go to extraordinary lengths to make your appreciation known – that’s turning it into a competition; feeling you have to prove your thankfulness, having that recognized as such, or wanting to continually “do things” for/with them as a sign of appreciation.

You don’t.

And anyone, or any situation, that makes you feel that you have to go to those extraordinary lengths is wrong.

I know all of my mentors and coaches until now have, for the most part, just been doing their job, as I’ve started to learn in several positions. And I know I don’t need to be your best friend, or throw you a party, or continually ask “can I do anything for you?” to show my appreciation. So, thank you. Thank you for choosing to give and not expect anything in return. Thank you for teaching me, for leading me, for encouraging and pushing me – for being an example and providing tools that remind me of you and have positively impacted my choices as I make my way through life. I know that’s enough now – because all of these lessons are beginning to be passed on to the people who can’t repay me, nor do I want them to; I’ll be needing more help soon enough.