The last year or so has been challenging for so many for so many different reasons. I’ve shared more than once that outside of everything else, I really struggled with the notion of how selfish and self-directed I saw people become. Or maybe they had always been that way and I was just able to see it more clearly than ever before.
It was honestly devastating. Not because I was naïve or sheltered and thought people were amazing and kind. Mostly because I didn’t realize how many people were in the ‘every wo/man for him/herself category.’ Hoards of people who were only concerned with the issues that impact them directly. Many, many people who actually fought against providing help to those who they might not directly align or associate with on a daily basis. Just revolting.
I understand that particularly during times or strife or suffering, it’s natural to want to protect your own, so to speak. I get that difficulties and struggles make folks more susceptible to those pointing a finger outside and blaming others for the wrongs and the so-called evils. I understand that this happens, but getting it doesn’t mean I need to like it. It doesn’t mean that I am going to accept it as something that works for me.
It doesn’t work for me. It feels demented and crazy and completely counterintuitive.
We all exist on the same planet together. We all share the same resources. Yes, there are people who are lazy and liars. Those people come in all different shapes and sizes and from all different socio-economic background. I mean it. Please understand that there is no way for you to make a claim that is not 100% discriminatory or racist whereas you decide that a particular group of people is disproportionately in this category. Well, unless you are talking about a group that was forged in hatred and survives on divisiveness. I’m not naming them here because I think you know who I’m talking about and even if you don’t, I feel like it gives them too much power to speak their name.
Anywho, this tragedy that befell us, this crisis, was the optimal time for us to come together. To support each other. To lift each other up. To exhibit the purest forms of compassion and kindness. The good news is that did happen. It definitely did. The opposite also happened. There were a lot of people that were angry and mean and extraordinarily harmful.
I got lost in the mire and muck of their hatred and dysfunction in the sense that it made me fairly despondent to consider that I was “surrounded” by this kind of sentiment, by this kind of behavior. Here is the thing: that is the wrong place to focus. That was the wrong behavior to exhibit. The better move was to pull myself up by plugging into the good stuff. By supporting people who were supporting other people. By helping people in any way that I could.
You might be thinking, much like exercise, that you don’t have the time or resources to help anyone. Or perhaps you are thinking that you don’t really want to help anyone because you feel like you desperately need help yourself. I get that. I really do. But you know what? That’s just not good enough. We can’t throw in the towel that easily. It’s not unlike the Bystander Effect. If each of us decides to give up, what are we left with? Who is going to be the hero swooping in to save the day?
No one, that’s who. We have to be our own heroes on some level. We have to decide that life is too precious and too long and too short to not care about each other.
So, how do you help if you are feeling sorry for yourself or you feel like you don’t have what you need to properly help anyone? Well, let’s start with that first bit. Although this is not ideal thinking, it is really good for certain situations such as the one I’m describing. Sometimes, the desire to feel better is more front of mind than the desire to positively impact those around us. So, with that understood, we need to see helping others for what it can be: a way to feel good about ourselves.
When you help someone else, you get a unique opportunity to feel like a rock star. So, if you can’t motivate because you are feeling too shitty about yourself and your situation, then push yourself because it will make you feel better.
Here’s the other fact that is important to consider. It doesn’t matter what you have because that is not what is meaningful when it comes to helping other people. Assistance can come in so many different forms and so many of them have nothing to do with an expenditure of resources. Nothing at all.
Don’t get me wrong, if you happen to have the resources, it is a swell time to support good organizations that desperately need the help or to help folks directly. For sure. But if you don’t, that should not be a limitation or a deterrent.
Sometimes people need someone to talk to. I’m not suggesting you be someone’s therapist. I’m suggesting that you be their person, providing them with a dose of human contact. Zoom, phone chat, socially distant walk. Whatever that looks like for you, you can brighten someone’s day by just being there.
You know what is also really meaningful in helping others? Having an opinion that is steeped in kindness and compassion and feeling comfortable to share that opinion with others freely. Not in a way that jams your thoughts and stance down someone else’s throat. Nope. Just in a way that does not have you participating in something that is incredibly harmful to others.
You know what is also meaningful? Educating yourself on issues that impact us as a society, even if they may not feel like they directly impact you. You should care about racism if you’re white, minimum wage if you are a higher paid salaried employee, and the environment no matter who the fuck you are, period, end of story. You don’t need to be at the forefront of these important discussions but maybe learn enough so that you don’t spread ideas and notions that are decidedly false and mostly harmful.
We live in a big world that is in so many ways, growing smaller by the day. Don’t you want to make the world a better place for all of us and not just for some of us?
You’d be surprised at how awesome you feel when you do something to help someone else. I mean it. Give it a shot. See how it goes. Try it this weekend.
Talk soon.
L.
thepathtoworthy.com 