Like many people, I have a weird relationship to asking for things. There are the ‘old tapes’ that tell me my wants and needs don’t matter. There’s the story that competent people can do everything without help. There’s the strange way I have of putting off outreach when I have the idea that I could use a hand. There’s the sense that I’ll be a burden, or risk losing my relationships by being perceived as a taker, or just that I’ll look like I don’t know what I’m doing.
Rationally, I am aware that asking has a lot less risk than I perceive, and that in truth, relationships are often strengthened by the vulnerability of asking and the feeling of caring helping can offer, when it’s requested and welcomed. But I still feel so much more comfortable being the helper, the connector, the service-giver.
Being in community helps with this, because every space is held by a number of people, and I can be of service while availing myself of the benefits of this kind of connection.
Still, though, I’m thinking that this year I am going to practice asking much more often, even if it’s for dumb things, and these are not going to be those low-stakes broadcast asks like, “does anyone know…” or something like that in Slack or on LinkedIn.
In the last year, I’ve had incredible results from asking. Usually my asks happen because I think of something quickly and I don’t get all caught up in the right way to do it. And it’s not about scheming, it’s about opening an opportunity for humans to be in connection with me or their own values.
Isolation is the dream killer, not your attitude.
Barbara Sher
I’m about to experiment with an Ask support group, kind of like the “Success Teams” described in this over-the-top, problematic, but still compelling TED Talk. Or in this TED Talk, which opens the door to thinking about jobs and economies and asking as a revolutionary practice. Kind of a mastermind group for figuring out things to ask for, what’s in the way, and then just making asks. I put this here, even if no one is reading, as a reminder to myself. What will we discover when we ask together?