I learned something uncomfortable about myself this week. I’m a helper.
That probably isn’t surprising to anyone who knows me. When someone I care about is struggling, my instinct is to move toward them. I want to make things easier. I want to offer support. If I see a solution, I want to share it.
For most of my life, I’ve considered that part of my softness one of the ways I love people, and I still believe it is. But I’m learning there’s a difference between helping someone and taking responsibility for something that belongs to them. Sometimes, in our desire to help, we accidentally step into the space where someone else needs to discover their own strength.
A Lesson I Thought I Had Already Learned
This realization hit harder than I expected because I've actually encountered it before.
Years ago, family members pointed out something about my relationship with my son that I didn't particularly want to hear. My instinct to step in whenever he was struggling wasn't always as helpful as I believed it was.
Of course, it felt like helping to me. I'm his mom. If your child is struggling and you have the ability to make the struggle hurt less, stepping in can feel like the most natural thing in the world.
It took me a long time to see another possibility. One of the things that eventually helped shift my perspective was reading Mel Robbins' The Let Them Theory. In parts of the book, she applies the idea to parenting adult children and explores what can happen when we continually step in to rescue them rather than allowing them to navigate their own lives.
Something finally clicked. Every time I rushed in to fix something, I was taking responsibility for something that wasn't mine to carry.
So I started doing something different. I set boundaries. I stopped automatically stepping in. I allowed my adult son to make his own decisions, including decisions I might not make myself, and trusted him to navigate what came next.
And something happened that I hadn't expected. I felt freer.
Not because I stopped caring, but because I finally understood that loving someone doesn't require taking responsibility for their choices. His life could belong to him, and mine could belong to me.
Then the Lesson Came Back
This week, that same lesson showed up again, this time in my development as a coach.
In a conversation with one of my peer coaches, we were talking about something I'd been noticing in myself. When someone is struggling, especially when I can see a possible connection or path forward, my instinct to help can kick in fast.
She said something simple that landed harder than I expected: sometimes, by stepping in to help, I'm not actually helping.
Oof.
I knew immediately why that sounded familiar. Different relationship, different circumstances, same instinct.
But she also gave me an experiment to try. Recently, I'd taken the Working Genius assessment, which helped me put language around some of my natural strengths. One of them is Enablement. I naturally want to support people and help them move forward. Another strength I can lean into is Wonder, the part of me that likes to explore, ask questions, and consider what might be possible.
So my peer coach challenged me to notice when my helper starts taking over and, instead of immediately following that instinct, lean into Wonder.
For me, that means getting curious. Not because curiosity is some universal replacement for helping, but because it's another strength I already have available to me. I don't need to shut down the helper. I can simply notice when she might be doing too much and invite another part of me into the room.
In coaching, that can look like wondering instead of knowing. What might be here that I haven't seen yet? What does this person know that I don't? What could become possible if I don't rush in with my answer?
That requires something from me that helping sometimes doesn't: trust.
When a Strength Starts Doing Too Much
That's the part of this lesson I've been thinking about most. Helping isn't a weakness of mine. It's a strength. Supporting people, encouraging them, and being willing to show up when someone needs me are qualities I value deeply in myself. The problem isn't the strength. The question is whether I'm using it intentionally or whether it's using me.
And maybe that's where the more important question comes in: Am I helping because this person truly needs my help, or because it's uncomfortable for me to watch them struggle?
Those aren't always the same thing.
Because even our strengths can become unhelpful when we don't know when to put them down.
The responsible person can start carrying everything. The independent person can stop letting anyone in. The peacemaker can avoid necessary conflict. The achiever can forget how to rest. And the helper can start taking responsibility for things that were never hers to carry.
None of those strengths need to disappear. Maybe they just need something beside them.
Softness Doesn't Have to Mean Rescue
I've also been thinking a lot lately about softness and strength. For a long time, I thought protecting my softness meant I needed to become a little harder. I'm beginning to think I had that backward.
Maybe softness doesn't need hardness to protect it. Maybe it needs boundaries. Maybe empathy needs trust beside it.
Maybe loving someone doesn't always mean removing the obstacle in front of them. Sometimes it means standing beside them while they discover that they can move through it themselves.
I'm practicing that now in coaching, in relationships, and probably in ways I haven't noticed yet. My instinct will probably always be to help, and I don't actually want to lose that part of myself. I just want to become more intentional about when I use it.
Because sometimes helping says, “Let me carry this for you.”
And empowerment says, “I believe you can carry this. And I'm right here while you do.”
Maybe that's a different kind of helping.
And maybe, sometimes, it's the one we need most.
