How helpful are you?

Yesterday, my youngest daughter asked me this beautiful question: “How do we know when a person is in need for help, Dad?” To be honest, I loved this question. I was curious to know why she had this question, so I asked her about that. She told me that she tried to search for the answers on the Internet, but she found it hard to understand. It is understandable for a girl at 10 years old. As her coach, I tried my best not to answer the question but guided her to find her answers herself. So, I asked questions, and she tried to give her best response. A beautiful way to end the night for both of us.

When I got back to my room, I thought about this event a lot. Recently, I shared my conversation with Marc D. Braun, an executive coach and experienced leader from Missouri on our #InsightsSharing channel. In that great talk, he shares about the impacts great people having on his life. His successes are the result of all contributions, support, mentoring, and coaching from those individuals. Then he summarizes these people with one beautiful word: CARE. They care for the people they work with, and they care for them to grow and become the best version of themselves.

Then I had to myself this question: “At what level are we helping others?” For generations, we have been imprinted with the idea that asking for help is a sign of weakness, so we avoid asking and receiving help. As a result, I believe that we don’t have the ability to spot when and how to help people properly, too. Let’s think about the level of involvement a person can be in helping someone.

At the lowest level, we ignore others, and our level of help is zero. Whatever happens to someone else is their business to handle, not ours. The next level is where we have the open-door policy and people can come and ask for help when they see it appropriate. At this level, they can come to you and ask for help. You then decide whether you will do that, or not. This is where our empathy muscle is put to the test. How would say no without hurting? If we say yes, how would we manage our help with the least impact on their feelings? Remember that asking for help is not in our DNA, so they are learning how to govern their emotions, too. I’ve witnessed many bad conversations at this stage, and it was not because of evil intentions from those who wanted to help. They just purely didn’t know how to handle it better.

The higher level is where caring leads the way. It happens when someone truly cares for a person. When you care for me, you will notice if something wasn’t right lately with me. You will see the changes in my behaviors & emotions, social interactions, physical appearances, etc... People at this high empathetic level take initiatives to engage in helpful conversations. They share their findings, then they offer help proactively. If you have such people in your life, hold them dearly.

There is another level which is the highest level of helpfulness where you see someone is potentially in need of help, you take time to figure out their problems without even asking. Then you try your best to solve the issues before the person even realizes them. And you do it with or without anyone knowing about your action. These people are angels, and if you have them in your life, you are blessed.

The higher the level of helpfulness, the bigger level of care we must learn to master. So, how? By observing better. Pay more attention to the world around you, to the people you are interacting with, to the things that are said, also to the things that aren’t mentioned. It is not easy, but like any games, you need to practice. Practice makes perfect, right? So our last question for you today is: “How willing are you to practice this game of being helpfulness?”