Need Somebody

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Since I can't feel my fingers properly some jobs are tricky to downright impossible. One of them is getting money out of my purse. Usually I shop with hubby and he gets the money out for me, but last week he dashed off to get an item we'd forgotten and the teller wanted my shop card.

So... I had to ask her to get the card out for me. It felt a bit weird and awkward as I explained how I couldn't use my hands properly, but then something surprising happened... somewhere in helping me the till operator changed. She went from being "stranger behind the till doing her job and ignoring all customers" - to - "friendly woman who is helping and really seeing me."

Admittedly our area is VERY friendly and 90% of shop staff, strangers in the street, will chat forever if you have the time. What was different this time was that I had to reach out first, by asking for help. It's not easy asking for help, especially if you're used to being self-sufficient or you're the type who prefers being busy helping others. Then asking for help yourself can feel like you're failing somehow... weaker, but it's not like that at all.

When you're totally healthy and self-sufficient you can also risk becoming totally aloof... cut off. You can't do that when you're disabled or ill in any way. I realised that needing to ask for help forces you to interact with others. For better or worse it reconnects you with other people and... it's actually kind of nice. :-) You get to talk to people you'd probably never talk to otherwise. Best of all - you give others the chance to feel good about themselves, for being the "Good Samaritan" that helped another - you!

We need more of that in our world - more people connecting to help each other.

We need to be needed, but we also need to be open to needing help,
to needing each other.

Maybe there is a secret blessing in this recent recession that we could tap into here? Modern society, cities and governments... they've all become the ultimate in aloof and self-sufficient. Maybe it's only by becoming "ill" and "disabled" that we will reach a stage where we all reach out to each other again. Maybe we need to reach that stage of admitting we need help, that we need each other, so we can make the world a better place?

Wouldn't that be nice? :-)

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