40+FAB Blog

A need to help

It is actually quite natural for us as human beings to want to help another. I see it all the time in a group of toddlers. When one is crying, all the others can be seen gathering around them to find out what is wrong and they try to make it better.

As we get older, we learn a lot of things that begin to block out our natural tendency to help. Things like biases we are taught, dishonest persons playing on our emotions for their personal gains, our selfishness or greed, fear, and a host of other reasons.

Soon we find it easy to walk past those crying out for relief from their predicament. Even when we feel a sense of the right thing to do, and compassion welling up, we remind ourselves of the reasons not to help, then we suppress the urge to.

We have a genuine human need to help others and suppressing it only kills a part of the person we are meant to be thus preventing us from ever reaching our full potential in many areas of life.

Check out the stories of those who have accomplished great things and you will find that quite a few of them stumbled on their greatness as they went about trying to help others.