Helping, Fixing or Serving?

Does it ever bug you when people try to help you?  “I can do it myself!” is something we hear preschoolers say when they learn to dress themselves or tie a shoe.

How about when people try to fix you?  We hate it, don’t we?—because it throws a spotlight on our flaws or shortcomings.

But good-intentioned people keep trying to help or fix people all the time.

But research is showing that when people try to help or fix someone, our threat alarms go off—because it takes away some of our autonomy.  Most of us want to “do it ourselves,” because we want to be seen as strong, capable and self-sufficient.

So what’s a better approach? 

In a great article called, “Helping, Fixing, or Serving” by Rachel Remen, she argues that, “Fixing and helping create a distance between people, but we cannot serve at a distance.”  She goes on to say, that when you help, you see life (or others) as weak. When you fix, you see life (or others) as broken.  [But] when you serve, you see life and others as whole.” 

When you serve, you start to understand that life is sacred, and that we’re all connected. 

In the Christian Scriptures, Jesus kneels like a servant and washes his followers’ dirty feet—then he tells them to go out and do the same. 

That night, Jesus served with his whole self.  And in the days ahead he kept serving humanity through his suffering, death and resurrection.

Service renews us!  It awakens us, and makes us grateful the life and gifts we’ve been given to share.  Remen reminds us that those who serve, see the wholeness in another person, and strengthen it.

Serving means getting up close to someone and connecting with them.  And when we do, Remen says, we come to know that we serve, not because life “is broken but because it is holy.” 

In the days ahead, I’d love to serve you as your coach—to develop the gifts and strength within you!  Because the world needs you at your best to accomplish the life of service you were born for.