Where do you draw the line at trying to help someone feel better about him/herself or a situation he/she is dealing with? It’s a tough one at times isn’t it. It can also depend upon the person whom you’re trying to help! If it’s a close family member we perhaps work a bit harder than we would for, say, a friend. Why is that? Is it because we love the family member more and so feel very unhappy when they are distressed, whereas the friend has less impact in and upon our lives? I’m sure that most of us would go out of our way to help family members more for all sorts of very good reasons. Although, isn’t everyone deserving enough to receive the best help we are able to give? At the end of the day, we’re all part of the same Soul and so equally deserving of the best.

There are a couple themes I think I’d like to get in today: 1) where do we draw the line at trying to help someone help him/herself, and 2) how the ego can be a pain in the butt!

Imagine this: you are a lighthouse standing tall and grounded, shining your light out to sea so that passing ships will be able to see any rocks or hazards. Now what happens if the captain chooses to ignore the lighthouse and continue sailing further along the coast towards the rocks? Should the lighthouse run along the cliff shining a light in front of the ship so that captain can see the hazards more clearly and so come to safety that way? If it did that, imagine what would happen to all the other ships that count on that lighthouse being where it was meant to be but wasn’t! You’d have a whole load of shipwrecks rather than just the one. Further, the ship that ignored your lighthouse may decide to turn back, may get picked up by another lighthouse further along the coast or the captain might even know the waters so well that he doesn’t need the light from your lighthouse. There’s also the unfortunate possibility that the ship will crash on the rocks – but is that your fault?

It's also like the metaphor I used the other week.... if someone is drowning in quicksand and you've thrown them a rope, you cannot make them take it. You can shout encouragement, throw the rope as near to them as you can, even seek ideas and help from others, but if the person in the quicksand doesn't want help getting out there's nothing you can do about it.

We can only help people insofar as they want, and are open, to be helped. We cannot save everyone from making mistakes that we ourselves have made if they don’t want to be helped. Sometimes the best way for people to learn is to experience something themselves and then we can be there to help them pick up the pieces if it all goes horribly wrong. The thing to do is keep shining the light of love from your heart to those that need it and, whether or not they acknowledge it, you’ll know that you’ve done your best to help them.

And this brings me onto my second point – the ego! The ego is a tricky little bugger at times and will try to twist even the best intentions we have to the detriment of ourselves and others. A few years ago, I used to do a lot of training to help people with their job-seeking skills. At the end of every workshop the delegates would leave and say something on the lines of “thanks that was great and really helped me” and so on. But, every now and then, there’d be the person who sat there stony faced throughout and would leave the room without even a thank you. “How rude!” I used to think. “I’ve worked for three hours with this person and they haven’t even got the courtesy to say thanks”. Without getting into the why’s and wherefores as to whether the person was rude or not, the questions we need to ask ourselves are: Why am I doing this in the first place? Is it for the thanks and praise or to try and help and make a difference? These questions brought me up short and are a constant reminder to me of why I do the work I do – because I love to help people and try to make a difference to the world. Yes it’s great to receive thanks and compliments – it feels good. But the most important thing for me when working with people is knowing that I’ve done the best I can, to be the best I can be, to help them be the best that they can be.

The ego will try to tell you that a person is rude and/or ungrateful if they don’t say thanks, and it will also try to make you feel inferior as a result. You end up putting yourself and the other person down! The ego makes no allowances for interpersonal behaviour preferences or what people are dealing with. It constantly wants us to judge ourselves and others in order to make ourselves feel like we’re better than someone else and not good enough to be the best! Like I said, it’s a tricky little bugger!

Bit of a long one this week but wanted to include both points. It’s worth thinking about people you’re helping and whether you’re pulling yourself out of your centre in order to do so. Try not to let yourself get so caught up helping one person who’s ignoring your support that you miss out on helping those whom you really can. Also, think about your motivations for helping – is it because you’re expecting praise or thanks back or because you want to help? Think about that next time you hold a door open for someone and they walk through without saying thanks ;-)