It’s difficult to imagine that trying to help someone, or really helping them, can be more harmful than helpful.

Yet, there are so many ways this can be true. And that’s not to say we shouldn’t be helpful. We’re moving into a humanity that is cooperative, helpful and supportive to one another. Yet, in our world of constant change and big transitions, we’re still dealing with a lot of personal growth and letting go of the old ways, before we leap into an era of peace.

So, consider, for now, that our self-awareness is more important than ever before, and there’s new information available now to help us grow. With that awareness, comes looking at what we’ve always done and being willing to examine the parts of that which have not yielded beneficial outcomes. Part of our shadow work is recognizing something called “the shadow rescuer” within ourselves. Sometimes we want to help, we can force help where it’s not wanted, and even when it is, it can turn out differently than we intended.

We can all imagine the scenario of the first-time mother coddling her baby so much that when it wants to learn to walk, every time it falls down, the mother rushes over, picks up the baby, kissing her child and interrupting the child’s learning process. While she’s not trying to harm her baby, the lack of awareness on her part does probably do the child more harm than good.

The child will build physical strength and the mental focus needed to pull themself back up to standing and to properly balance to figure out how to walk. The baby will fall a bunch of times, it’s a part of the learning process. And throughout all processes there will be ups and downs, the falls will always happen, and we’re best to find the strength to pull ourselves up on our own.

We’ve all heard of enabling, which is another form of help that does more harm than good.

For the people pleaser, this is tough news to hear. Healers and empaths absolutely want to help every living being on the planet. We can’t get through this life without help from numerous others. So how do we know if we’re doing more harm than good?

How to Identify the Wrong Kind of Help

Did you offer help before they asked you to?

Do you know them in a personal capacity?

Yes to both spells trouble.

Giving donations to a charity, volunteering, or supporting a local business by buying from them when you could buy cheaper at a big box store are healthy ways to help where there’s not a personal component, but there is an intention to help without expecting anything in return. It has a lot of “feel good” value in it, as the right kind of giving makes us feel good inside.

The wrong kind of help starts with attachment to the outcome and the person or group you’re trying to help. Parents might know best, but they’re also better off knowing when to step back and trust that their help may be needed and wanted elsewhere. Forcing help on someone can lead to them resenting you. Helping someone you’re crushing on in hopes of a date might cost you trust and a good friendship.

Anytime we give with the expectation of being recognized as giving – it lacks feel good value and carries the essence of entitlement, and possibly self-righteousness. The wrong kind of help has the energy and feel of worry and anxiety attached to it. This can happen early on in a relationship where gifting too much and too soon can be seen as a red flag, especially if the giver is seeking attention or praise in return for generosity. Generosity with strings attached feels heavy, not life giving.

When to Avoid Giving Help When it Seems Harmless

I know people who won’t give a homeless person money, but who will give them a hamburger or other food product instead. It’s an example of “responsible helping”. These givers know that giving money may contribute to a drug overdose or drug addiction for this person. They would rather help the person in a way that they are sure is healthy and helpful. We all need calories to survive.

Unwanted help is a hard pill to swallow for the giver or rescuer. Ever try to help someone get sober who doesn’t want to get sober? Ever try to give someone advice who didn’t ask for it and doesn’t want it? Small comments can seem harmless, and they can be taken to extremes in the minds of others. It’s more prevalent in close relationships, like parent-child or newlyweds, to be hypersensitive whereby small things can be misconstrued or misunderstood and “blown up” unexpectedly.

If you feel yourself drawn to helping, before you act without thinking, take into account some of these factors. Am I attached to this person or the outcome? Am I overstepping boundaries? Am I enabling bad behavior? Am I looking for attention or praise? Am I offering help where it’s not wanted? Could helping this person turn out badly? Am I harming myself or giving more than I can really afford to help someone else? A “yes” to any of these carries too much weight to be of light, life-giving energy.

Once you notice the help you’re about to offer feels “off” in some way, resist the urge to ignore your intuition. Intuition plays a very critical role in when to sit still, and just observe. At any sign of anxiety or tension when thinking about offering help or when we do find ourselves offering help – take pause, and you might even retract your offer stating, “On second thought, I really want to see you get the help you need, so much that I almost made a promise I can’t keep. Sorry, I don’t have the resources right now to help you.”

There’s nothing wrong with mis-speaking and acknowledging it. Clarification and communication is key, and so is compassion when you have to avoid helping someone you genuinely care about.

Why Boundaries Are Life Giving

To an empath, a helper type or a people pleaser, the feeling associated with boundaries seems like the opposite to the idea of helping someone. A boundary is a barrier, where we think we’re trying to make a connection so that we can aid the other to finding a better way. Yet, this is not a correct assumption.

Boundaries to outside interruptions is one of the most life-giving and self-care gifts we can create for ourselves right now. Our best strength will be found in a solid and calm core of Self. As we feel our connection to all that is, we then become attuned to a creative energy that is swift and easy. Suddenly, we can find ourselves just observing from the outside and knowing intuitively when and where we can jump in and out of someone else’s story to help.

We have to create boundaries with our own ego as well. Our ego can be our greatest saboteur. It’s going to try to get us to stay the same and preserve itself, while we’re in the middle of a transition which is expansive and connected to all of creation. We must be aware of when our ego kicks in and we are attached to an outcome, including being attached to being able to see or take credit for the outcome. If we put up a boundary to our reactionary ego, we can move onto the next moment of life without a worry about the previous one.

Being in the moment in every moment will help us tune into the energies around us and use our intuition to know when to engage or when to sit the next one out. We have to learn that we can be strong with our boundaries by being an observer until we are called to act. We can also have the experience of being completely at peace while at the same time putting up boundaries. When we do this, we are helping more than we know. And we don’t need to know.

Letting Go of the Need to Be Needed

This is also a hard lesson to learn, but as we accelerate into our best life as a creator of our own story and co-creator of the collective consciousness that shapes reality, we must shed our old skin.

Every transition requires shedding the old and coming into a new and renewed self and sense of self. Most of us do this over and over again in life, especially those of us who have spent many years being single or those who have had several career changes. It’s wonderful to keep recreating ourselves and to keep growing and learning throughout life. It’s a time when we need to focus on growing into our best life.

As we start to work with what we have, we learn to understand the weight that drags us down and back into the same experiences from our past. We learn to identify that, and to change that particular thing. If we find that our need to be needed causes us stress and we want to be free to create our own story, then we should take a deep breath and just focus on our own highest vision of what we want to see our life look like.

Self-care and self-reflection is far more important at this time than looking to the outside world for what needs fixing. There’s no helping ourselves with spending our moments looking outside of ourselves to get dragged into unnecessary dynamics. If we know ourselves and we operate from the core of who we are, we will have a steady ride, without needing the world to see that and verify it.

Self-confidence is key. That’s a different blog. For now, using intuition to foster and nurture your own growth is so comforting and helpful to you, and that’s enough to keep you in your own cocoon until you want to emerge. Start by investing in yourself. Surround yourself with your best vision and the best environment to make your own dreams come true.