I’m embarrassed to say it, but I’m not good at asking.
And if you’re anything like me, you probably don’t know it’s a problem. Even after writing this, re-writing it, editing it and re-reading it, only now is it starting to sink in how painfully harmful not asking is!
Since I was old enough to be seen, there were three things you couldn’t overlook about me — my stubborn spirit, precocious independence, and emotional maturity.
As a result, my parents always treated me as an adult, my big sister saw me as an older sister (even though we were three years apart), and as a teen, I ended up playing the parenting role for my younger sister.
Even though it was a rough time for us all, I was always seen as “having it together”.
Until my body broke down…
At 15, walking down the aisle at the pharmacy, I passed out from extreme pain in my abdomen, and ended up in hospital and found my liver was failing.
At 22, I almost died of septicaemia, but I didn’t tell my friends, or my family until well after I was in the clear.
At 24, after leaving my hometown, I developed a gut condition, and a severe skin condition turned autoimmune. But no one back home knew.
Now the way I see it is… when we don’t ask for help when we are afraid of being seen, and when we don’t listen, our body makes us. In my case, through sickness. Because sickness forces us to ask. It forces us to be vulnerable, and it forces us to be seen.
At 15, when my liver failed, it encouraged me to see a psych.
At 22, when I almost died, it pushed me to confide, trust and be cared for by my romantic interest, who I fell in love with.
At 24, it allowed me to reach out to my sister. Who encouraged me to come home, (literally) be seen, and it became a massive catalyst for healing.
As you can see, it can hurt not to ask. But often we won’t do it anyway because it’s uncomfortable, because of our conditioning.
In my family, they always saw me as the one who had it “together”, any-time I wasn’t visibly “together” they’d freak-out (in their own way), and it snapped me out of vulnerability. My dad, aggressive when feeling out of control. My mum, a debilitating worrier. And my sister, overly optimistic and always reinforcing how “strong” I was.
All of whom I deeply love by the way. 🙂
But it’s not just family. This is a widespread, social conditioning towards “strength” being masculine-independence, while feminine collaboration and connectedness, or asking for help, are seen as “weaknesses”.
So we shut down our emotions (and others’) and don’t ask for help because it’s weak, and not helpful to anyone, right?
Wrong. We couldn’t have got this more wrong.
Emotions. Asking. It’s all uncomfortable at first, but it’s worth it.
When my mum first saw me with my condition, she cried.
Though mortified by how I looked, it was even harder for her to see me cry. So she tried to suppress it by saying — “you don’t need to cry, you’re the strong one…”
There it was again, “the strong one” — our conditioning.
It wasn’t until I finally stood up and admitted, “I may not need help, but I want it! Sure, I can get through things on my own, but I don’t want to. I don’t believe it’s strong to suffer in silence, and it’s not weak to cry! It’s strong to ask.”
And that’s when I saw how helpful asking really was…
Asking didn’t just help me, it helped those around me!
This ripple effect ensued where my friends and family started stepping out of their life-long conditioning and dived into their deep discomfort. And I couldn’t help but have this profound respect for every single one of them.
One friend (close to me), who had refused help for years! Asked for it, saw a psychologist and started thriving. Another finally decided to leave an abusive dynamic she’d been trapped in for decades, and then saw someone about it.
And if I’m honest, I’m still not good at asking. But since then, I’m getting better.
Know, it’s strong to ask. It’s honourable to ask, and it’s kind to ask.
Because…
When we ask, we allow others to ask.
When we are vulnerable, we allow others to be vulnerable.
When we have the courage to be seen, we allow others to both see and accept themselves.
So not only does it not hurt to ask, it helps to ask.
And bit by bit, with each of us who has the courage to ask, we take down our social masks, break through our conditioning, and create this ripple effect. Where we help others to forget this made up story we’ve been telling ourselves. We break this masculine and feminine imbalance so we can love it all. Every. Single. Side. Of ourselves.
Imagine what the world would look like then.
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Now I’d love to hear from you. What are your thoughts on asking? Where in your life do you struggle to ask? And how, at times, have you been able to overcome your own conditioning?
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Lots of love,
Jessica