On Being Helpful...

I have a relative, who shall remain nameless, who can't see someone struggling with something without trying to help. That is often a great thing and he does help we he can. But, he sometimes tries to help even we he can't and in so doing makes the situation worse. I'll give an example: I am very tech savvy, he is not. I was struggling to figure out the navigation system of a rented car and he couldn't help himself from trying to do it himself. But rather than helping me, he got in my - trying things that I had already tried or that were simply wrong. I don't mean to say that we should let the "experts" alone and not contribute on matters in which we know less. Sometimes you need to be ignorant about something to view it in a new creative way, My point is that when we see someone struggling, we should fight the frequent urge to try to take over the challenge and address it ourselves - even if we are in no better position (or even a worst one) to do it. What can we do? How about offering specific help, such as "do you want me to hold the manual for you?", or "do you want me to call someone and ask for help?". Or, if you believe you have specific information the person is missing, you could share it politely, e.g., "Have you tried the Red cable on the top instead of the bottom".

Another related issue is when too many people try to help at once. The poor person who is struggling has to deal with a cacophony of voiced giving him contradictory recommendations. This can be particularly bad when the struggle is related to hearing something, which obviously is nos imposible to hear on top of all the advice. Why did I discuss this topic? Yesterday I was trying to put the buggy inside the balsa that takes us across the Cunhau River. It is best to go in reverse to make the exit from the balsa easier. I was struggling with the buggy and couldn't understand what the balseiro was telling me. I knew he wanted me to move the buggy, but I couldn't figure out where to. As I was using all my concentration powers to understand his Portuguese, one of the boys started telling me (rather loudly) to leave the buggy where it was. In so doing he made it harder for me to hear the balseiro and wasn't helpful - even though he obviously had the best of intentions.

I think it is human nature to try to "take over" when someone is struggling with something. Reminds me of the scene in the movie Airplane in which a passenger becomes hysterical and the other passenger start taking turns trying to calm her down - until you see a line of people with ever larger weapons...