You know, we don’t need much from each other in the way of encouragement. A simple note can go a long way. I have grown used to receiving a certain amount of random correspondence on a daily basis, so much so that I often take it for granted. I don’t realize how much of a boost I get from that simple human connection until it disappears for a while.

Thinking about how deeply I feel the absence of my daily e-mail fix, I started to wonder at the effect my own e-mail might have on others. When I write a simple note to someone letting them know that I enjoyed reading a particular article or just asking how things are going, do they get that same little boost of energy? Do my letters mean as much to others as their letters mean to me?

The only sensible answer is, of course, yes. We all need a certain amount of human interaction on a daily basis.

It’s easy to think that other people won’t care whether or not we write to them. Everyone gets inundated with work, with family, with personal obligations. It’s easy to assume that people would rather not have one more thing to deal with, or at the very least that one small note will never be missed. But each of us is a part of the whole. Every time we decide not to reach out to another human being, the action not taken is sorely missed, whether we realize it or not.

So my November resolution—I believe in monthly resolutions because, let’s face it, a year leaves far too much time for procrastination—is to do a better job of connecting into that web of humanity with a few more e-mails of my own. I resolve to write more often to friends and family and even to complete strangers, to let them know that I noticed or remembered them, that I value them enough to grant them my time and attention.

I’d also like to offer my reassurances to everyone out there that I value each and every e-mail I receive, as long as it was personally intended for me. (No one likes junk mail, do they?) Even on the days when scores of messages arrive at my virtual doorstep, I still value each and every one of them because every single one represents a real human being who took the time to reach out to me. That in itself is a tremendous gift, and in my opinion, you can never receive too many of those.