Not All Help is Helpful

I got off the phone with my doctor on a cold December morning in 2021, and, still trying to hold back tears, called my friend Karen.

Once she answered, the tears came spilling out of me as I asked her for a ride to my next appointment.

I called Karen, not because she was the only person available. Because I trusted she would meet me where I was — no questions I didn’t have the energy to answer, no strings, no version of help that came with conditions attached. I knew that because of the history we shared together. I felt safe being vulnerable and messy with her.

I was debating whether to ask at all. Surely I could drive myself. There was no medical reason for a ride. And I was proud of my staunch independence — a quality I’d been praised for since I was two years old.

Except I couldn’t drive myself without crying the whole way, and that’s not a safe way to take a busy interstate full of construction. So I made the call. It was the beginning of a long stretch of asking for and receiving help, as one appointment became many, and then became surgery.

What surprised me was the silver lining — asking for something I could technically do myself made everything more manageable. Getting the help I actually needed enabled me to progress more steadily than staying married to I can do this alone ever would have.

But not all help works that way. And that’s where it gets complicated.

When Help Doesn’t Meet You

I can think of more than one time I’ve hired a coach believing they’d help me leapfrog forward, only to realize partway in that they were better at selling the idea of transformation than actually delivering it. They wanted me to fit their process. Not the other way around. I didn’t make the progress I expected — not because I didn’t do the work, but because the support wasn’t built around what I actually needed.

I think about the people who wanted to help me during treatment, too — who cared, and meant it, but helped on their own terms. Which sometimes meant I had to do the emotional work of managing their help before I could receive it. Coordinating, explaining, reassuring, making it easier for them to show up — when what I needed was to be the one being cared for without strings attached.

That’s a strange kind of tired. You ask for help, you receive something, and you’re still left doing the work.

Why We Stop Asking

And here’s the quiet consequence of that experience, one I don’t think we talk about enough. When help doesn’t meet us, we don’t usually conclude that person wasn’t the right fit. We conclude asking wasn’t worth it. So we go back to doing it alone — not because we’ve regained our independence, but because we’ve been let down enough times to stop expecting anything else.

I see this in organizations too. A manager delegates something, it doesn’t come back the way they pictured it, and next time they just do it themselves. It feels efficient in the moment. But it quietly trains a team not to be trusted with the harder things — and it puts the manager back at the center of everything, doing more, delegating less, wondering why no one steps up. It’s the same loop. Just wearing a blazer.

We don’t make this easier on ourselves by celebrating people who need no one. Self-made is a compliment in a lot of rooms. Needing nobody gets applauded. And so the instinct to protect ourselves from another disappointing ask — that instinct gets to hide behind something that looks like strength.

What Attunement Looks Like

Earlier this year, I worked with a library system that had tried, more than once, to build a culture where staff felt equipped to hold boundaries with patrons — calmly, consistently, without the interaction escalating before anyone had a chance to catch it. They’d led discussions about it internally. They’d brought in trainers before. Off-the-shelf programs.

Good intentions. None of it had been the right catalyst to trigger a lasting positive change.

What made the difference this time wasn’t just that they asked for help. It’s that I didn’t arrive with a fixed program and expected them to fit into it. I met with them first. Listened. Understood what they were actually navigating day to day. Some of what I’d normally include, I cut. Some of what wasn’t in any standard curriculum, I built in — because it’s what their team needed, not what a training package assumed they’d need.

One of the librarians put it simply afterward, the team is calmer now, and more assertive. They check in with each other more often. Things don’t go from calm to crisis in a matter of seconds anymore, because they have language for the in-between — the moment before it escalates, when a check-in is still possible.

That’s what attuned help looks like. Not help that arrives with all the answers. Help that starts by asking better questions.

Challenge Accepted

The lesson here isn’t simply ask for help — although, if you’ve been burned before, I hope you’ll consider asking again. The harder, more useful practice is staying discerning about whom and how you’re asking. Noticing when the help you’re receiving is actually meeting your needs, and when you’re quietly doing the work of managing someone else’s version of support.

This week, I’m inviting you to get curious about the art of asking for and receiving help.

Where in your life or work might you be carrying something alone that doesn’t need to stay yours alone?

When you look at the help already around you — a coach, a colleague, a mentor, a friend — how well does it actually fit? 

The goal here isn’t just to evaluate whether or not help exists. It’s to find attuned help, which is possible when there’s trust, and breathing room for you to articulate (and sometimes also process) your needs in conversation with someone capable of providing meaningful support. 

And if you’ve gone quiet about asking, it might be worth reflecting on what experience taught you that. Sometimes the reluctance to ask again isn’t independence. It’s an old disappointment or fear that continues running the show.

Cultivating your ability to ask for and receive help isn’t just a nice to have skill, it’s hardwired into our DNA. As humans, we are pack animals. We need each other to thrive. And when we ask, people have a chance to give, which is rewarding.

I’m lucky, I still call on Karen for help. Sometimes she’s not available, but she’s always caring.

And when she can, goes out of her way to be there for me in just the ways I need. That relationship has empowered me to get better about seeking out and getting more attuned help personally and professionally. 

Resource

If this resonated with you, I created a free handout. Getting Attuned Help Worksheet is a simple tool to help you make these ideas actionable. Download it here.