Imagine you’ve set aside the time to bake something special—you’ve preheated the oven and started to mix the ingredients when you realize you’re an egg short. Once, it would have been the most normal thing in the world to pop over to your neighbors and ask if they had one to spare. Today, not so much. If you live in a big city, you might not even know your neighbors’ names and in any case, all manner of tech “solutions” have sprung up to save us from ever having to talk to each other. Why bother asking someone for a favor when you could have a carton of eggs delivered to your door in under 15 minutes?

Well, there might actually be a good reason, and not just because it could save your cake. In our increasingly atomized societies, asking for favors gives us a valuable connection with the people in our community. It can strengthen social bonds and provide an opening to forge new friendships. After all, favors are about more than the act itself. When someone picks you up from the airport, they don’t just save you the bus fare; they give you the comfort of their presence on the ride home, a feeling of rootedness and the knowledge that somebody took time out of their day to make yours a little better. You might see it as a small act of care.

Need to ask for a favor? Here are some tips that might come in handy. First, judge the scale of the request appropriately. Go ahead and ask a total stranger for directions or a glass of water, but if you want $500, or a kidney, it’s advisable to choose somebody you know well. When you’ve selected the right person, be polite but direct. It’s fine to say: “I have a favor to ask,” but give some context to your request, explaining why you’re asking them in particular (you could employ a little tactical flattery at this juncture). Be sure to give them an easy way to refuse, and if they do say no, accept it courteously. Get it right, and you might end up with a new friend—somebody to lean on when you need something a little more important than a single egg. Just be sure to do the same for them when the time comes.