What Lives Underneath your Desire to Help?

When asked what they do, or what their purpose is, many people will give the response that they're here to help people.  That is a beautiful thing, as it can be an expression of the heart, offering your gifts and allowing others to receive the benefit of that.  One thing that is key to insure that what you are offering is truly helping people is to check in with what is driving your desire to help.  One thing that can be there that we may not be aware of is that we would like to be seen as a good person, a helpful person, or a valuable person.  Or we may be driven by a desire to feel good about ourselves.  When these underlying motivations go unchecked, or when we haven't yet become aware that that is what's driving us, our helping is often out of tune with what people actually need.  We think we're helping, but because our driver is to serve ourselves (to feel good, to be seen as a good person, to receive appreciation from others for who we are and what we provide), often the helping can actually harm others or dis-empower them in subtle or overt ways.  When we are overtaken with this good feeling as we're helping others, we often aren't able to be as present to truly tune in and see whether what we've offered them has truly benefited them or met their request or desire to receive help.

When our driver to help others is based on a need to feel good about ourselves, like a good person, or to get something from others (love, appreciation, and acknowledgment) and aren't conscious of these desires, these are common things that can occur:

• You decide what other people need without asking them
• You offer what you think they want, which is often based on what you need, in other words, you project your needs onto them.  Say for instance you are thirsty but your focus is solely on helping others, you will go around finding people who you think needs a drink of water.  Sometimes you will find people who are actually thirsty, and your offering does help them, but often you will find people who aren't thirsty and you'll either convince them that they are, make them drink, or walk away blaming them for just not seeing or getting how thirsty they are.
• You will feel resentful if they don't receive your help or value everything you've done for them
• If you don't feel good after providing the help or they refuse to receive the help or they don't seem to be benefiting from it in the way you want them to, you will make them wrong in some way, or blame them for just not getting it, or tell them that they are "sabotaging themselves" or "have resistance" or find another reason for how they are deficient in some way
• If they don't see you as a good person after providing help you with either feel negatively towards them and resent them, or withdrawal and have a desire to punish them in subtle or overt ways.  This is often mimicking the behavior that was shown towards you through your childhood when other people were "helping you" or doing things that they thought were "good for you" that didn't actually meet your true needs and they got upset when you weren't responding to their helping in the way they wanted you to.  This can often lead to adopting beliefs such as people can't meet my needs, no one can help me, I have to figure things out on my own, I'm alone, and people always let me down.  This can play out as you being compelled to meet others needs, help others, figure things out for people, make sure that you are always there so they never have to be alone, or go the extra mile or above and beyond to insure that you never let them down.

So, what do you do if you become aware that you desire is driven by a desire to be seen as a good person, helpful and valuable or to feel better about yourself?  The first thing is to acknowledge it and take a breath and see it for what it is, like becoming a witness of it that just names that it exists, kind of like a scientist reporting findings from a study.  If it is a desire to be loved, appreciated and acknowledged, you can list ways to get that need met and get curious about how else this can show up for you.  You can also consciously choose to offer love, appreciation and acknowledgment to yourself and get curious about who else can benefit from some of that.  

After that you can check and see if the flip side is underneath, the not wanting to be seen as a bad person, or worthless, or not helpful, or selfish, or self serving.  Or feeling unloved, unseen, unappreciated and unacknowledged.  You could identify some people in your life that contributed to you feeling that way and also where you have contributed to other people feeling this way.  There are many different methods to support the resolution of this, whether it be a path of forgiveness, clearing, integrating the memories, bringing your awareness into present time and acknowledging what's different now.  If you would like assistance with this process you can contact me. 

When the need to be seen as right and good, and the feelings underneath of being bad and wrong have been brought to the light of consciousness and been integrated, it is often much easier to get in touch with your hearts desire to contribute to people, assist them, benefit them in their lives and create a different future for you and the people around you.  When helping is offered from this space, it is often very empowering for people, you are responding to their requests for help, you are willing to ask whether what you're offering is what they need, and can receive the feedback when it isn't helping and either redirect them to someone else, or change your approach.  So, may we all become aware of what is driving our desire to help others, so that we can be in tune with each other and benefit each other in ways that assists all of us to feel loved, safe and supported to thrive in our lives now and in the future.