Be the Helper

Lip service. We’ve all gotten it. It’s when someone tells us the thing we want to hear and never follows through by actually doing the thing they promised. “Sure I’ll help you move on Saturday.” And then they don’t show up.

Maybe their intentions were honorable and something unforeseeable happened. Tough to believe this, but perh

aps their words were meant to appease us, to shut us up for the moment and shoo us away. In either case we’re disappointed because a couch is really hard to carry up three flights of winding stairs!

In the real world, I call this “The Little Shit”; annoyances and aggravations, the stuff that momentarily pisses us off but we’ll get over. Then there’s what I call “The Big Shit”. Trust me on this one, you’ll know the difference.

When life throws a major curve-ball that hits us like a sucker punch to the soul. Everything we know is turned upside down and our life is thrown into a flux. We’re shocked, paralyzed and suddenly alone, living in a bad B movie. We’ve not prepared for this. Who does?

You’d choose to carry 10,000 smelly couches up three flights of winding stairs if doing so would make the big shit go away.

This is when lip service is harmful.

We must choose to seek out comrades for their wisdom and knowledge and guidance. And accept help.

Whether professionals, friends or complete strangers, we need to hear from The Helpers. They’ve crawled around in the trenches, walked the walk and will show us their battle scars, only to prove by standing in your presence, they’ve survived and so will you.

Call them The Helpers, Angels, God-sends, Blessings, Companions, or Supporters. They will show us the way, the path to healing, from experience. No lip service.

They can’t do the hard work for us. But they will be the solid foundation, the resource we go to over and over.

Whether the eventual outcome is what we hope and pray for, or not, is anybody’s guess. But along the way we’ll have learned some valuable lessons on compassion, love, strength, courage, humility and survival.

And then it’s our turn to be present, hold a hand, bring resources; grab the other end of the smelly couch. No lip service. Be the helper.

BE F-G AWESOME TODAY!

Original graphic: Stephanie DelTorchio
Image: Volkan Olmez/Unsplash