Asking for Help

This week I want to talk about something that has been on my mind for a very long time, years. The idea of asking for help and all the “stuff” that brings up for people.

I’ve noticed many experiencing resistance, judgment, and guilt around asking for help.

Most of my life I felt tons of judgment towards myself for asking for any help. So I understand why people avoid asking others for help and how it could be viewed as a bad or disempowering thing.

But what if it's not a bad thing?

If you’re going through something and you require more info, ideas, a different perspective on things, just ask. If you were to speak up and ask, maybe things would flow so much easier.

Why stress yourself out spinning in circles trying to resolve something, when you could perhaps ask and have the situation shift, sometimes in an instant!

I find it funny that most of you wouldn’t hesitate to take your car to a mechanic, pay a restaurant to help you with cooking meals, or hire daycare to help with watching your kids. But, for some reason asking for assistance with more personal or private life areas seems to be a touchy subject.

I have many clients telling me that they must put everyone first and they feel their loved ones wouldn’t understand why they are coming to see me.

So, often people are walking around holding in all this worry, pain, and struggle inside. Pretending everything is great because they are afraid they will bother others by asking for help.

The amount of shame that people tell me they feel when opening up to others is mind boggling.

So what can you do to allow yourself to ask for help with more ease?

1.) Find someone who makes you feel comfortable. It’s important to feel relaxed and not feel judged by the person you’re speaking to. Perhaps ask them a few questions to see how they respond.

If you feel tense or the instinct to shut down around that person, trust that insight and find someone else that you can open up to and fully be yourself around.

2.) Realize that asking someone for help or their insights about something does NOT automatically mean they know more than you or that you’re disempowering yourself.

Yes, others have different points of view, and we can get stuck in thought loops, ruts and have our blind spots. But when you ask another for their perspective you still want to check in with yourself to see what resonates with you and what doesn’t.

3.) Practice asking for help with little things first. Notice where you get triggered, maybe make a small list of what comes up for you each time you attempt to ask for help.

Did you ask for help in the past and it didn’t turn out so well? Maybe you have fears that if you ask for help, you’ll be indebted to another, judged, talked down to, given wrong info. Whatever it makes not of it and let all that go! 

We are all here to help and contribute to each other, and we all require help at certain times.

This week play around with asking for more help, you’ll be amazed at how much support is available and how happy others are to be there for us. Remember to have fun! :-)