look for the helpers

Yes, I walked all the way up...

Mr. Roger's mother got it right when she reminded him to "look for the helpers" when he saw scary things happening around him.

"When I was a boy and

I would see scary things in the news,

my mother would say to me,

'Look for the helpers.

You will always find people who are helping.'"

~Fred Rogers~

Helpers are especially important when bad news arrives around the holidays...when illness strikes, a loved one dies, a neighbor's house goes up in flames, or depression takes its toll.

Who are these helpers? How will we recognize them? Here are five sure signs you're looking at a helper:

• Helpers meet trouble head on. Like deep winter snow, they go right out into it and plod through it just to help others through it, too.
• They ask existential questions. Why? Why do bad things happen to good people?  Why now, during the holidays? They confront the ultimate mystery: why not? Why are any of us spared? 
• Reflecting on the work they have chosen, they are grounded in empathy. They suffer right along with the people they care for.  
• The fact that they encounter suffering and understand what it's about solidifies their sense of purpose.
• They consider service a privilege.

 

"The best way to find yourself

is to lose yourself

in the service of others."

~Mahatma Gandhi~



If you are a health care provider--a doctor or nurse, a nurse practitioner or a physicians assistant, an EMT, or a therapist in any field--you are a helper. If you are a first responder, we depend upon your help. If you work as a caretaker, a teacher, or a pastor, you're a helper. If you are a parent or grandparent, you are definitely a helper. If you staff a food kitchen or a homeless shelter or an animal rescue, you are one of us. If you drive a snow plow, repair our roads, or haul away our trash, you are helping. What would we do without you? How would we get through the holidays? How would life go on?

Each of us is a helper in our own special way. We encounter each other every day at the intersection of give and take, of sorrow and joy, of pain and pleasure.

When you see scary things happening around you, do what Fred Rogers did when he was a boy. Look for the helpers...and remember that you are one of them, too.

"The world is full of

healers, helpers, and lovers.

If you can't find one,

be one."

~from Treehouse of Hope~

jan