Helping Hands

If the last couple of weeks kept me busy preparing and this week has been all about recovery, then I’m here to tell you, moving forward has me really coming to terms with things I’m not very good at.

Apparently all of my good, hard effort at developing patience has all but flown out the window, along with something else I’m even worse at… asking for and accepting help. While we’re on the subject of things I’m not very good at, let’s throw in being a person who has great ideas but very little follow-through action.

Have something you want to come up with an idea for? I’m 100 percent your gal. Want to see the idea come to fruition? You should likely seek elsewhere. It’s a flaw I’m keenly aware of and one, like my level of patience, I find myself continually working on. But, as a self-proclaimed procrastinator, I’m not holding my breath for any miraculous recovery.

One thing I have learned over the last several days is that you really can’t rush things, and some things shouldn’t necessarily be changed. I’ve been laying around, mostly with an icepack or three covering the swollen parts of my arm, in a painkiller induced thought pattern evaluating and re-evaluating the way I’ve lived, and the way I want to live my life moving forward.

Some of the things I want to change are doable, others not so much. Others still, well, not even a snowball’s chance in you know where. So I’ll focus on the doable changes.

One of those areas where change is doable for me is recognizing more when I need help, when I need to ask for help and when I can be the giver of help.

As someone who is not very good at asking for help, I appreciate those who look past my “I can do it” mantra and just show up, not making a big deal out of it, and helping me do something I clearly cannot do. What I need to get better at is actually asking for help.

Somewhere along the line I developed this feeling that asking for help is a sign of weakness. I don’t know how, I don’t know where, and I don’t know exactly why I developed this thought pattern, but I did. I don’t see offering help to others a sign of weakness on their part, so I’m not sure why when someone offers it to me I think that way. I guess that’s why I’ve identified it as something I’d like to work on moving forward.

I’ve been the receiver of help over the last few weeks. The first of three instances came when I was trying to organize my studio/creative space. I’ve been trying for months to get this done, and get my daybed, one I was given for my high-school graduation by my mom, up into this space. Many have offered to help and my standing response has always been “I’ll let you know.” Leave it to a friend to just set up a time to do it, letting me think I would be helping, yet not letting me help really at all. In less than 15 minutes, the bed was moved from my storage unit up a sketchy flight of stairs, and is now where I’ve wanted it to be for months.

The second instance came by way of a wonderful neighbor who brought breakfasts, dinners and snacks, complete with enough for leftovers to get me and my other half, through the first five days of my recovery at home. This gave me the time to heal and not worry, and my other half the time to focus on taking care of me.

The last instance has come from people who, through their friendship with my parents, are actually more like family. It began in their generosity of giving my horse a place to live and now caring for her for a little bit when I can’t. I miss my horse like crazy, but I know she’s in good hands, and I’ll be back to spending time with her in no time.

In all of these instances, people, friends and family have given their time and effort freely, without expecting a thing in return. They have taught me an initial lesson that it’s okay to ask for and accept help when it’s needed. More than that, they’ve reminded me it’s important to be able to help when we can, and how wonderful things can be when we can receive help without feeling guilty. It begs the question…how much better could our lives be with just a little help?