Asking for Help

“Vulnerability sounds like truth and feels like courage. Truth and courage aren't always comfortable, but they're never weakness.”

― Brené Brown, Daring Greatly: How the Courage to Be Vulnerable Transforms the Way We Live, Love, Parent and Lead.

Illustration by Marty Molinari

On a college day recently we were looking at Acceptance & Commitment Therapy (ACT) and in the course of the day we were given a set of 35 cards each with a life value written on it.  The instruction was to pick a card representing one of the values that we hold true and talk for five minutes about why we do.   As I looked through the cards I kept getting drawn to the one with a picture of a black Labrador and the words “Asking for Help” on it.  I have never considered this a value.  I launched into my five minutes off the cuff spiel and this is what I told my fellow students.                                                                 

As I was growing up I learned early on that asking for help was not really an option.  In fact, I would be seen as weak if I did.  The maxim  “what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger” was the norm. The adults around me seemed to be very anxious and worried but they never spoke about how they felt or asked for help from anyone.  They just got on with it as best as they could and we were encouraged to keep ourselves to ourselves and not to wash our dirty laundry in public.   

I was a child who wanted to try everything, even if often discouraged from doing so.  Discouragement didn’t deter me and albeit that my entire insides were marinating in anxiety I strived and achieved, strived and achieved.  Sometimes I made mistakes and suffered the consequences.  I was living the concept of feel the fear and do it anyway.  I don’t believe that acting from this place of high anxiety ever did make me any stronger. I was still anxious.  So I do not ascribe to that maxim.  

When as a child it is not a good idea to ask our caregivers for help it becomes very difficult as an adolescent and adult to do so.  If we believe that we need to be self-reliant and are supposed to be perfect, then asking for help can be very difficult.  We may suffer low self-esteem from previous hurts and we may believe that we might be judged as weak, looked down upon or even ridiculed.  

Luckily, as an adult I knew in my gut that talking to another about a problem I was having and asking for help was a wise thing to do, even if it meant that I might be ridiculed or scorned.  This was particularly true in my chosen career as a sole practitioner solicitor.  Working in the legal system, which is by nature an adversarial one, it was never an easy place to ask for help, especially not from ‘the foe’.  For sure it was a risk and one could definitely be perceived as weak for doing so, but I was willing to do it, somehow I knew I had to, especially when my anxiety levels were through the roof.  So when I needed help, I carefully chose who I would ask and I picked up the phone and asked.

I invariably got the help that I needed from my colleagues, and when I did I got empathy and understanding too.  The fact is that we are all struggling when suffering from fear and anxiety.  Another fact is that virtually everybody has a strong drive for helping other people.  By asking for help, we provide the other person with an opportunity to do something meaningful for us and to experience gratification because of this.  Furthermore, asking for help is way of implicitly praising the other person.  Because, by asking for help, you imply that you trust the other person and view him or her as able to help you and therefore as a competent person.  I definitely experienced this reciprocity when I asked for help as in some cases strong collegial bonds followed and at other times collegial friendships began.   I am immensely grateful to all my colleagues who helped me over the years.

What I realise now is that I was living with vulnerability and courage and not weakness as I had been led to believe.   I was ‘daring greatly’ from my early days as a practitioner in an arena where some of my colleagues were doing likewise.  In her book Daring Greatly Brené Brown says that ‘daring greatly is being brave and afraid every minute of the day at the exact same time’ and there were many days like this for me.  

So let us remember that asking for help is essential. It is not a weakness. In fact, it makes us stronger.