A Wednesday morning with a simple question on the board: What can I do for you?
It is a plain sentence that has zero poetry to it. It has no flash, but there is weight behind it if you mean it.
That question carried Lou Holtz through his life as a coach, a teacher, and a man. Not because it sounded good, but because he lived it. He understood something most people didn’t understand. If you focus on helping others, you don’t have to chase meaning. Meaning will find you.
I have written that question before. Not perfectly, but enough to know it changes how you walk through the world. Lately, I have been thinking, I want this to be part of how I go out.
I don’t want to copy another man or borrow his voice. I want to build my own version of that question. Something that fits my hands, my life, my story. Because the truth is, life has a way of narrowing things down.
My parents have gone to heaven. I’m an only child, so I have no brothers or sisters beside me. I’m no longer married or in a relationship. Those parts of my life don’t exist. There is no circling back to them, no revisiting what was. Those chapters are closed, and are not coming back.
What Is left isn’t nothing. What’s left is everything that still matters.
I’m a father.
I’m a friend…
… and if I’m being honest, that is where the real work is anyway.
There is no hiding in those roles. No titles to lean on. No shortcuts. Either you show up, or you don’t. Either people can count on you, or they can’t.
So this isn’t about writing a quote on a chalkboard. It’ i about becoming the kind of man who can stand behind it.
“What can I do for you?” only means something if you’re willing to follow through. It means listening when it’s inconvenient. It means showing up when you are tired. It means putting someone else’s need ahead of your own comfort.
It doesn’t mean being everything to everyone. That is a mistake, it means being reliable to the people God has put in your life. The ones who look to you, whether they say it out loud or not.
Your children.
Your friends.
The ones who trust you enough to lean, even just a little.
Faith plays a role here too. Not the kind you talk about to sound good, but the kind that steadies your feet when things feel thin. The kind that reminds you that service isn’t weakness. It has alignment and purpose.
If you want peace, you prepare yourself to serve.
Si vis pacem, para bellum.
If you want peace, prepare for war. But maybe the war isn’t always out there. Maybe it is the daily fight against selfishness, against drifting, against becoming someone people can’t rely on.
That is the real battleground.
Winning that fight doesn’t look dramatic. It looks like consistency.
So maybe my version isn’t going to sound exactly like Coach Holtz. Maybe it is quieter. Maybe it is rough around the edges, but if I can walk into a room, whether it’s with my kids, my friends, or anyone who crosses my path and carry that same intention…
What can I do for you?
Because at the end of it all, people don’t remember what you said nearly as much as they remember whether they could count on you. And if I can become a man people can lean on....
.....through faith, through trust, through showing up, that will be enough.
