The definition of availability refers to “those I serve”. To understand availability you must first understand who you serve. We obviously serve those in authority over us but don’t we also serve our peers? Good leaders serve those they lead. So being available means being ready to help others wherever we are and to do so cheerfully. If you look at the opposite quality of self-centeredness you can better understand Availability by thinking of it as “other-centeredness.   Mohammed Ali said, “Service to others is the rent you pay for your room here on earth.”

The character trait of availability is the heart attitude we need to have to serve others.  For this to happen on a day to day basis we need to lay aside our own ambition and be ready to serve others.  We must strive to make our own schedules and priorities secondary to the wishes of those we serve.  Availability is not always a matter of duty, it is a voluntary spirit.  Thinking of availability as something I have to do will ruin the spirit of it.  Availability is something that you should be happy to do, because you are committed to the success of others.   Availability is being ready and willing to help.  In short this means putting others’ needs ahead of your own and lending a helping hand when you can.  Availability is similar to team sports.  When individual combine their efforts toward a common goal, they can achieve what they could not do alone.  With team spirit and cooperation, victory waits just around the corner!

Four steps to making yourself available to others:

1. Put others ahead of yourself.
2. Find a way to help, not a way to hide.
3. Be ready when you are needed.
4. Be glad for the chance to serve.

Availability begins by recognizing what needs to be done, or asks if a need exists; and then acting on the knowledge by showing itself present, ready, and willing to assume the responsibility.  George S. Patton said, “Always do more than is required of you.”

Choosing to serve others is a choice, an act of the will. You don’t become a servant by sitting around and hoping that one day you’ll feel like it. You might never feel like it. That’s why we have to make a deliberate choice each day.

Think of the people that come into your life every single day. These are the people we need to serve. These are the people you need to pour your life into. Your wife, your husband, your children, the people you work with, the people at church, and your neighbors next door. And it’s as we’re willing to humble ourselves and serve others and put the needs of others before ourselves, that we demonstrate true greatness and reflect the character trait of availability.

When we take opportunities to serve others it allows us to invest in others and to serve.  There have been times when I have made myself available to help others and that service to others has allowed my life to have more meaning and purpose.

Our daily goal should be to look for practical ways to serve people that cross our path today and every day.   Rosten Edward Everett Hale said, “I am only one, but I am one.  I cannot do everything but I can do something.  And I will not let what I cannot do interfere with what I can do.

Originally published in the Owasso Reporter