This week, we've been moving through a progression. We started by acknowledging the pain — naming it honestly, refusing to pretend it isn't there. Then we talked about what you'll actually be proud of when you look back. Yesterday we got practical: the monthly bill audit, the mindset shift, the quiet freedom of the eight-dollar shirt.

Today, we talk about people because none of the rest of it holds up without them.

We All Need a Connection

Maslow postulates that the human need for connection is a driving force behind motivated action (1962). This need can be described as the need to be witnessed. To be witnessed is to have one's existence acknowledged by another. It is the sense that you are not alone, that your experience matters, and that someone else recognizes it.

Meaningful connection requires curiosity about another person's internal state. It requires attention, energy, and a willingness to engage beyond the immediate task. Connection is about acknowledging the other person and recognizing that their differences are not a barrier to engagement. It requires the ability to see the person in front of you as they are — perfect, whole, and complete. It is an approach to relationships grounded in generosity and kindness.

What Real Companionship Looks Like

Real companionship in a season like this looks like someone who tracks where you actually are. It involves empathy — genuine curiosity about another person's experience, rather than waiting for their turn to speak. And it involves a certain restraint: not leading with your wins when your friend is carrying a loss.

If all you can afford to do right now is day trips or camp, it's genuinely hard to sit across from someone describing their luxury vacation. That's not a weakness. It's just human. If you're having the worst week of your life and you go to lunch with someone who spends the meal talking about their vacation home, that friendship may not survive this season.

The person sitting on the other side of you is not a bad person; they are probably just excited about the latest win. And the reality is that we all need to share in our successes and failures. But connection requires attunement. And attunement requires empathy.

Empathy isn’t automatic; it is a skill built slowly through experience and the willingness to sit with someone else's discomfort. The people in your life who show up well right now — who ask how you're doing and actually mean it — have usually learned that the hard way.

If you are having a hard time right now, it is okay to lean towards those who can relate and lean away from those who hurt you.

Finding Your People

Start with honesty. Not performance, not spin — just the truth about where you are. You don't have to broadcast it. But when someone asks how you're doing, try telling them something real. You'll find out quickly who can handle it.

Look for the people who suggest coffee instead of dinner. The ones who show up without an agenda. The ones who seem genuinely relieved when you say something honest, because it gives them permission to do the same.

Those are your people right now. And right now is exactly when you need them.

The Upside of Hard Times

Here's something worth holding onto, even if it's hard to feel right now: by the end of this, you are going to be a better person.

Not in a motivational-poster way. In a real way.

You will never be able to unknow what it feels like to be under financial pressure. You will never be able to unknow what it means to work hard and come up short. And when someone tells you — years from now, in a different market — that they're struggling, you will know exactly what they mean. You will know it in your body.

That changes how you listen, how you advise, how you show up for clients, colleagues and friends. This market is also teaching many of us what we're entitled to ask for. When you reach out and someone shows up — really shows up — you learn what that feels like. When they don't, you learn that too. You start to understand who in your life is actually capable of showing up, and you stop wasting energy on the ones who aren't.

What We'll Carry Out of This

When this market turns — and it will — an entire generation of service providers will emerge who know what it means to struggle. Who have developed, through necessity, a genuine capacity for empathy that no training course could have taught. Who understands, firsthand, what their clients are carrying when they walk through a difficult transaction.

That is not nothing. That is quite a lot.

We will come through this stronger, more honest, and a great deal more useful to the people who need us.

Tomorrow we'll talk about affordable mental health supports — practical options for realtors who need more than a conversation but aren't sure where to start.

Co-Authored by

Jordan Penner, MAA, RCC

Jordan Penner, MA, is a Registered Clinical Counsellor with twenty years of experience helping individuals, couples, and families navigate mental health challenges. His career spans work in provincial mental health integration programs, behavioural intervention with children and families, substance abuse recovery, and clinical intake coordination. He holds a Master of Arts in Clinical Psychology from Trinity Western University and is trained in CBT, DBT, EMDR, Narrative Therapy, and Solution-Focused approaches. Jordan practices in Surrey, Langley, and Delta, BC, with a particular focus on resilience and working with people in high-pressure industries. 

Site: https://jordanpenner.com

Book Session: https://jordanpenner.janeapp.com