Help Yourself (You Deserve It)

Are you the type of person who would rather be lost for hours than ask someone (especially your significant other) for directions? Or you spend hours trying to assemble a piece of Ikea furniture in order to avoid the embarrassment of asking someone (in my case, my 11-year-old son) for help?

Kudos to you if you said no to either of those. But many of us shy away from raising our hand and admitting to needing a hand.

For the most part I’m proud of my ability to ask others to weigh in, or step up, or step in when I don’t have the particular skills or answers that I need. I’ve even put my tail between my legs and now happily relegate all my home’s technical problems and fix-it needs to Teddy (the said 11-year-old).

What I’ve noted with Teddy, and many others, is the joy they get from being asked. I recently listened to a great podcast on this very subject which verified my thinking: Asking others for help not only gets you what you need, but it improves that person’s confidence and builds trust. If you’re coming to them, then they must be doing something right, right?

It’s for this reason that I sometimes even ask others to help out with something just to make them feel good! Even when I’m pretty sure of the answer, I get reassurance. It also shows that person that they matter to me, and their insights are valuable. 

Of course we need to be careful to not create a “boy who cried wolf” scenario. If we ask too often or don’t show any effort on our own part, those around us will lose patience and take our legitimate asks less seriously.

When it comes to “the ask” I believe it’s all about balance. Right person, right time, right question. 

But even if we have a good reason, pride often gets in the way. I’m here to say, f*ck that! 

Here’s a recent (humiliating, yet entertaining) example of what happens when you don’t play your ask cards right. My brother is a contractor, so not only does he spend his days building beautiful homes, but a great deal of it is spent fixing problems. Which also makes him the go-to person in our family (and extended friend circle) whenever anyone has something that needs fixing.

In my case, those needs extend from my home to my car and technology, cooking, and life in general. (In other words, everything.) Yet he’s also known for his straight-to-the-point, minimal dialogue. So while I know he’s always happy to help me (I may be putting words in his mouth), he is at times short with me when I ask (though he always gets the job done).

Feeling like I’d been a nuisance to him, I decided to book an appliance repair technician to look at my refrigerator door since it was sticking when I opened it. After booking, confirming, arranging, and paying my $150 non-refundable fee for him to show up, I was educated in the art of refrigerator repairs.

In this case, it involved moving the appliance a mere few millimetres over so it didn’t rub against the wall. You can imagine how embarrassed I was. Thankfully, the lovely repairman did his best not to make me feel like a complete moron. And needless to say, the financial waste paled in comparison to my brother’s amusement (and slight aggravation) when I told him what happened. Moral of the story: I’ll be asking him first next time.

And then there are times when we aren’t necessarily in need, but we have a want, yet we don’t want to ask. Whether that’s for a promotion, more money, more time, or more attention —  you don’t get it if you don’t ask for it. Again, right person, right question, right time, should be taken into consideration.

I’m happy to say I did better with this recently than with my fridge fiasco. I have been honoured, blessed and blown away to find out that Arlene Dickinson (yes, THAT Arlene Dickinson) is a fan of The Bullet. We had a brief exchange a few months ago where she shared some incredibly kind words. Then just last week I made a comment on one of her Instagram posts, which led to another brief exchange, which led to me taking a deep breath and reaching out to her to ask her if she would share her love of The Bullet with her social media following. And no less than five minutes later, she did! (If you don’t already, follow her everywhere, please and thank you.) Needless to say, it made my day, week and possibly year, and has had a major impact on our readers and followers.

Was that luck? Possibly. More likely, it was right person, right question, right time. And you might not always get what you want, but without asking, you’ll get nothing (except maybe an expensive non-repair bill).