Do you have the ability to ask for help?

Nixie

Nixie

Resurrected
MBTI
ENTP
I am sure it exists somewhere (no links please) but I am curious about whether you can ask for help or not? Can you accept help when it is offered? Why or why not?

I find that if I can rarely accept help from someone who isn't within the boundaries of my inner circle. I rarely ask for help either. I can sometimes ask for help if I really need it--like getting the stupid clip thing hooked back onto my headlight because I don't have the strength in my fingers to do it--dudes are great about helping a female when it comes to car crap! I am so harsh about myself and seeing it as weak to need others although I rationally know it isn't possible to live in this world alone. I have found this to be something that I have to work on. It limits my ability to allow others close because I am not truthful about my needs.
 
Sonyab said:
I am sure it exists somewhere (no links please) but I am curious about whether you can ask for help or not? Can you accept help when it is offered? Why or why not?

I find that if I can rarely accept help from someone who isn't within the boundaries of my inner circle. I rarely ask for help either. I can sometimes ask for help if I really need it--like getting the stupid clip thing hooked back onto my headlight because I don't have the strength in my fingers to do it--dudes are great about helping a female when it comes to car crap! I am so harsh about myself and seeing it as weak to need others although I rationally know it isn't possible to live in this world alone. I have found this to be something that I have to work on. It limits my ability to allow others close because I am not truthful about my needs.
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Yeah this is absolutely true for me also. I feel like I have let myself and others down if I need to ask for help. I know this isn't true but that is how it makes me feel if I find myself in that position. That is a large reason why I am so miserable right now, is because I am almost entirely reliant on other people.

I have a hard time asking even those in my inner circle for help. I don't even like asking my husband for help lol... So yeah, this is clearly something I have an issue with :[

I am getting better about asking my husband for help with things though when I need it. It's still not easy for me, but I'll force myself to do it because I know it is what he would want and it is what is right and I'm just fooling myself otherwise.

I also don't like to make a big deal out of an illness, even if it is really bad. I will downplay my pain or discomfort a lot of the time when asked and I don't like other people taking care of me when I am sick. After I had my baby (I had a cesarean) I was up and about as soon as I could be and doing laundry and cooking and everything else I would normally do, even if I was feeling like crap and it hurt to move. It has to get really serious or have me really paranoid for me to say anything about it.
 
I'm actually pretty assertive about asking for help once I've recognized and accepted I have a need. I think I feel empowered by knowing what action needs to happen and taking steps toward resolving the issue. In the end experience, it's sort of irrelevant to that feeling of empowerment if the resolution comes entirely from me or is only initiated by me.

Sometimes I have after-the-fact anxiety about being in debt to someone who actually did come to my assistance when asked.
 
Yeah, for the most part I do. Sometimes I feel like doing things my own way. But usually if the person isn't bossy, and genuinely wants to help I always let them. Even if I don't think there idea is the best, it's better to let them because it makes the other person feel good. The worst that can happen is you can share a bond with someone and work towards a goal. Or the person can screw up miserably and things can go terribly terribly wrong and you make an enemy. But that only happend to me once..
 
I am sure it exists somewhere (no links please) but I am curious about whether you can ask for help or not? It's difficult for me to do so.

Can you accept help when it is offered? This I'm getting much better at doing.

Why or why not? Why can I accept help now?

It's all because a friend introduced the concept of "Receiving" to me. He said hard headed women were creating problems for themselves because they refused to receive help or compliments or gifts from others (especially from men). Since I totally resembled his remark :lol: I said I'd look into a book he recommended called "Things Will Get As Good As You Can Stand".

It finally dawned on me one day when I began to see how much pleasure and joy I felt when I gave or did things for others out of pure love for them. You know - no strings attached kind of stuff.

What if they refused or minimized my gift just because they felt uncomfortable with receiving ( like I do to them)? Sometimes when they did minimize it - it diffused my enjoyment of the giving. I realized I was doing that to many people over the years who had tried to help me or give me something of themselves. That made me sad to think I had not allowed them to feel their own joy or happiness.

So now - I make it a point to graciously receive any gift from others - whether it be an offer to help, listen, condolences at any loss, say compliments about me, to pay or fix something for me that I need. And believe me - I have had to bite my tongue to keep from uttering words I would have normally said to play down their gift(s) to me - over and over.

It's stupid really for me to think I'm stronger than them. What is that? Arrogance? I'm sure that's how I come across sometimes. I think another aspect is that I fear asking for help because I might be refused. That's being vulnerable - which is good for me... It helps keep me soft in my heart.

Believe it or not - it gets easier with practice. Turns out - the more I receive - the easier it is for me to ask for help.

And yes - people that know me - now know more of me - and our relationships are richer for it.

I still struggle with feelings of being needy - but they're not quite as strong as they used to be.

I think all of us could use with being aware of our needing help. Whether it be those of us who have issue with asking for it even though we need it - as well as those who ask for it all the time because they won't help themselves. An increase in awareness works both ways - yes?

[MENTION=698]anica[/MENTION] Anica was just talking about this today.

So yeh - I understand what you're saying.
 
Fo you have the ability to ask for help?

My therapist of many years once described me as "pathologically independent." I took it as a compliment. Imagine my gorror when I became conscious of my conditioni immediately after th strke, which was complretely helpless. Whil I was in ICU I didn't have to ask for help; the octors and burses did whatever they needed to do to keep me alive. It was when I was transferred to a ewhab hospiyal that the struggle over asking for help began. It took the help of many people to set me on the road to the recovery of my independence, and even after my discharge from rehab a year later, it was still a struggle.

While I was ub rehab I found the following hand printed on a phonebook cover: "Ask for help when you meed it. Just don't ask to often." I think that's become my credo for the last 20 years. It's served me well.
 
I think one thing that makes it easier for me to ask for help is to understand that asking for help is simply a request.

I wonder if there may be a commonality between people who feel obligated to help every time they are asked (regardless of available resources to engage with the task) and people who are reluctant to articulate their needs.

If someone tends to think any request for help brings with it an obligation to respond affirmatively, then I can understand why there would be a reluctance to put anyone else in that position of obligation.

Perhaps a shift in thinking could ease this. See a request as just a request. It is information. It is up to the person being asked to determine their resource boundaries and to honor those boundaries in responding to the request. There is no shame in saying, "No, I can't do that right now." I also tend to think there is no shame in saying, "I am in need of X."

I don't feel any harm has been done if someone is unable to help when I ask. I tend to feel more harm is done when I refuse people the information they need to make fully informed decisions about their engagement with me.

Those situations where someone doesn't ask for help because they really believe they can do it themselves is something different. That is not a recognized need and the only relevant information there is, "I think I can do it myself." It only becomes something worth speaking about in terms of need when it exceeds one's self judgment of competence.

I can't know what someone else's needs are. I wouldn't choose to judge negatively someone else's expressed needs simply because they are greater than mine would be or because they exceed my capacity to meet them. That's my experience not theirs. It's my right and responsibility--not anyone else's--to determine my available resources and communicate that to others; either in stating my need, or in putting up my hand and saying, "I'm tapped out."
 
I am getting better at this. I generally can ask and do ask except when the person I need help from is less than approachable. Then I exhaust every possible solution before *cringe* asking.
 
It actually depends on what do I need help on and the people I ask for help. but as much as possible, I wouldn't really ask for help if I don't really really really really need it.

When it comes to studies... I feel bad that I ask for help because I feel like I'm wasting their time. I feel bad for taking a bit of their time just because I'm stupid.

Emotional problems... it depends on the intensity :)) If I can handle it, I would keep it all to myself. But if it becomes too much (I would know if it's too much if I'm starting to get uneasy and if I feel alone), then I just have to share it and ask for help :)

I often feel like a burden to other people if I ask for help.
 
Sonyab said:
I find that if I can rarely accept help from someone who isn't within the boundaries of my inner circle. I rarely ask for help either. I can sometimes ask for help if I really need it--like getting the stupid clip thing hooked back onto my headlight because I don't have the strength in my fingers to do it--dudes are great about helping a female when it comes to car crap! I am so harsh about myself and seeing it as weak to need others although I rationally know it isn't possible to live in this world alone. I have found this to be something that I have to work on. It limits my ability to allow others close because I am not truthful about my needs.
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+1.

I guess it's a form of trust issue. I do not know what to expect, or what not to expect from help for strangers. And a form of rejection avoidance; being rejected hurts. :| But help freely given from strangers is something I definitely cherish.

Asking help, however? if possible, no. Please. >_<; I'd rather do it myself.
 
tovlo said:
I think one thing that makes it easier for me to ask for help is to understand that asking for help is simply a request.

I wonder if there may be a commonality between people who feel obligated to help every time they are asked (regardless of available resources to engage with the task) and people who are reluctant to articulate their needs.

If someone tends to think any request for help brings with it an obligation to respond affirmatively, then I can understand why there would be a reluctance to put anyone else in that position of obligation.

Perhaps a shift in thinking could ease this. See a request as just a request. It is information. It is up to the person being asked to determine their resource boundaries and to honor those boundaries in responding to the request. There is no shame in saying, "No, I can't do that right now." I also tend to think there is no shame in saying, "I am in need of X."

I don't feel any harm has been done if someone is unable to help when I ask. I tend to feel more harm is done when I refuse people the information they need to make fully informed decisions about their engagement with me.

Those situations where someone doesn't ask for help because they really believe they can do it themselves is something different. That is not a recognized need and the only relevant information there is, "I think I can do it myself." It only becomes something worth speaking about in terms of need when it exceeds one's self judgment of competence.

I can't know what someone else's needs are. I wouldn't choose to judge negatively someone else's expressed needs simply because they are greater than mine would be or because they exceed my capacity to meet them. That's my experience not theirs. It's my right and responsibility--not anyone else's--to determine my available resources and communicate that to others; either in stating my need, or in putting up my hand and saying, "I'm tapped out."
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This is probably more rational than my approach, but I think we may be talking apples and oranges. I determine whether I'm physically *capable* of doing something myself before asking for help, partly because most people do feel obligated to help once they see the wheelchair; in fact, they sometimes offer before I ask and when I in fact don't need help. So mine is round a specific issuue.
 
I'm not too big on asking for help either, but then over the years I have designed my existence to where I don't need much help anyway. At work I can ask for back-up, say if I a task needs to be handled and I won't be there to do it, but this is more professionalism than asking for help in actually doing something. I have friends who are frightfully good at asking for help (in a Tom Sawyer kinda way) but they are of a very different temperament from me.
 
I ask for help when I would need it, otherwise I would scan every possible way I could do it myself, which sometimes doesn't go the way I plan and people end up getting annoyed at me and just helping me..(This is what I experience at work currently.)

I enjoy doing things alone and doing it at my own pace, asking for help may sometimes just fuck you up even more.
 
I understand what K-gal is getting at about letting others help and all that stuff. I am still unable to really put this ideal into practice. I will say that I am a lot less annoyed when others want to help me but that isn't the same as being able to ask--it is more like conceeding than anything. I think Tri is right, it does boil down to trust. I have a very little trust for outsiders and am very hesitant to place trust in others at a quick rate. I know that is my biggest flaw. I always feel like the Creator has placed this huge bullseye on me regarding this issue--so far I have remained relatively unscathed but I detest the idea that I must open myself up to trusting others more. I am more of a "no one enters this secret place, the barriers only I embrace" kinda person. :/
 
I have a very hard time asking for help. Reason being is that I am afraid of being a bother to others and their reactions. I am getting better at it though, specially among my closer friends.
 
Sonyab said:
I am sure it exists somewhere (no links please) but I am curious about whether you can ask for help or not? Can you accept help when it is offered? Why or why not?

I find that if I can rarely accept help from someone who isn't within the boundaries of my inner circle. I rarely ask for help either. I can sometimes ask for help if I really need it--like getting the stupid clip thing hooked back onto my headlight because I don't have the strength in my fingers to do it--dudes are great about helping a female when it comes to car crap! I am so harsh about myself and seeing it as weak to need others although I rationally know it isn't possible to live in this world alone. I have found this to be something that I have to work on. It limits my ability to allow others close because I am not truthful about my needs.
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I am able to ask for help.
I believe I have read that INTJs tend to be acutely aware of their inadequacies.
When I come to the point of realizing I can't do something right, I will ask for help... mostly because I hate making mistakes. :becky:
 
I would rather make mistakes than ask for help though. I am very aware of my shortcomings but even the idea of being wrong doesn't really push me to be more forthcoming and ask for help.
 
Sonyab said:
I would rather make mistakes than ask for help though. I am very aware of my shortcomings but even the idea of being wrong doesn't really push me to be more forthcoming and ask for help.
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+1

One can be very aware of their problems, but it does not necessarily mean that they will be pushed to ask for help. There's an underneath layer of emotions that can prevent someone from doing so even if they needed, weather it is fear, an independence streak etc.
 
I have the ability, I just prefer not to use it. I have to deeply trust someone before asking anything of them, even help. If I had to ask for it, I express my gratitude the best way I know, even if it was some little, and to others, not so meaningful thing they did for me.
 
It is strange, but I have a huge problem asking/receiving help from others. Whenever my family tries to send me money to help out for college, I refuse. Whenever I am mentally conflicted I sort of just shut it out from anyone. I wish I was not this way, but I just can not seem to help it. My guess is mental and physical independence is something I hold dear. I do not like it.
 
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