Let’s say you’re walking along and stub your big right toe. Would your first reaction be “Wow, my left toe feels fantastic!”? If you’re anything like me, you’re probably too busy swearing.

And yet it does. Try it right now. Bring your attention to your big left toe, or some other part of your body that is not experiencing pain, and notice how it feels. The absence of pain is quite lovely and spacious. Luxurious even.

As humans we are far more oriented to the stubbed toe. The pain, the shock, the message that something isn’t right, that something needs to change. And we need to pay attention, it’s important. But let’s not forget the parts of us that are ok, resilient and allowing us to stand.

As helpers, if we only attend to the pain of others, we can feel overloaded, at risk of compassion fatigue and burnout. Equally if we only pay attention to strengths, we run the risk of minimising distress or becoming a relentlessly positive cheerleader that people would rather avoid.

True empathy is not just connecting with the suffering, in the way empowerment isn’t just believing in someone’s potential. It’s about seeing the whole person. The pain, the resilience and the hope. They are all real. If we focus on one at the expense of the others we are missing the full story and, in doing so, we miss the quiet gift of the unstubbed toe.

When resources are scare, we need to get the best out of every role, and out of every person filling them. Including managers. Even when we feel like maybe they ought to know better, do better, be better.

I don’t mean suck up to them, play to their ego or tell them what they might want to hear like pampered poodles. And I definitely don’t mean turn a blind eye to bullying, threats or intimidation.

I just mean that managers are people too, often caught in the middle management sandwich – more judged than praised by both more senior executives and the team they manage. Their role is typically isolating, without peers with the exact same position description.

It’s a position of high expectation and low validation, where success is often defined by the absence of disaster. It requires a fluid blend of mentor, administrator and bearer of bad news. And a lot of the tasks are repetitive, with no satisfaction of a finish line.

Like anyone else, they will have strengths, weaknesses, blindspots and insights. They will make assumptions and assumptions will be made about them. They will make mistakes. Everyone makes mistakes.

A title or a pay check don’t guarantee performance. Managers’ roles are defined and shaped by relationships, up, down and sideways. While each person is ultimately responsible for how they conduct themselves, no role exists independently of others. And like any relationship, it is a two way street where the foundations of kindness, curiosity and acceptance matter.

The foundations of good conversation are no mystery to the point they can sound like a cliché: listen, ask open questions, reflect understanding, seek to draw out the other person’s wisdom, be selective and restrained in offering your own.

We know the kind of qualities we want to embody: respect, curiosity, kindness, empathy. We know the kind of relationship we want to foster: collaborative, equal, honouring, empowering, safe.

Yet we are also all too familiar with the things we do over and over that, when we have a chance to reflect on what we’re doing, we know aren’t so helpful. We talk when we need to listen, persuade when we need to understand, jump ahead into solutions when we need to slow down, pay attention to the task or paperwork rather than the unique, complex and precious human in front of us.

Because the basics aren’t basic. Understanding something, even on a deep intuitive level, is not the same as being able to do it effectively and, just as important, consistently.

And in helping conversations the basics are not being done in simple circumstances. Walking seems straightforward until you find yourself on an icy footpath, trying roller skates for the first time, nursing a sprained ankle or on a tightrope above a ravine.

When it’s hard to maintain the basics, it can be tempting to reach for something more, something else, something technical. And sometimes that can indeed help. But sometimes what we really need to do is return to the basics, and keep returning, until we are able to spend more time there.

Much like the level of focus we need to stay present in mindfulness practice, protecting the foundations of good conversation is an active process that we can spend a lifetime refining.

When we turn up to support someone, we are offering something – an ear, faith, knowledge, a process, an experience of acceptance and worth, skills, hope. Whatever it is we want to be intentional and do our wholehearted best for the other person.

But to fully embrace what we offer we also need to be able to receive it. To accept someone’s desire to support us, to pay attention to what it feels like to be truly heard, to receive someone’s goodwill and positive feedback with grace.

We want to be familiar with the different reactions we may have and not just on the good days when it felt good to receive the support. We need to lean into the discomfort too. When the help isn’t wanted, we’re not ready or it’s not what we hoped to hear. When it’s clumsily delivered or misses the mark.

And we need to be willing to go out of our comfort zones because we ask others to go out of theirs every day we show up to help. To risk failing, to risk succeeding. To face the unknown, to see ourselves and our potential with fresh eyes, to look for our blindspots and biases, reflexes and defences.

We need to embrace the whole two-way process or we’re only doing half of our work. We need to be able to ask for what we need because we want the people we support to be able to do that too. And that, quite possibly, is far harder than learning a new technique or strategy.