Seeking help is different from asking for a favour!

How wretched is the person who hangs on by the favors of the powerful.
Burn, Robert

We need the help of others to get things done. For the same reason, others also need our help. But many times we feel hesitant to seek help for the reason that we mistake ‘seeking help’ as ‘seeking a favour’. These two are different things.
When we seek help, it presupposes that the other person has the resource to help us without in anyway breaking any rule. For example we need coins for currency note and we go to a bank and request them to help us have the coins.
 

 However, when we ask for a favour from someone, it means that we want something which we are not normally eligible and the other person should break some rule or exercise his discretion to satisfy our request. For example, our friend is in a position of power and authority to employ people and we approach him to hire us out of turn or ignoring a disqualification we have. This is asking for a favour!
We should ask for help any number of times. But we should think twice before asking for a favour since we may be embarrassing others!
Think of an occasion when you asked something from someone. Was it a request or a favour?

N C Sridharan
www.thetimefoundation.com
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Help others with a grace and elegance!

To do more for the world than the world does for, that is success.
Henry Ford

We live in a world where we need the help and cooperation of others. Others also need our help. We have to work with others and get what we want. We have to establish a mutually respectful and healthy relationship while dealing with people around us. 

Normally a person seeking and receiving help may feel embarrassed or hesitant and the person giving the help may feel proud that he is in position to do so. Hence, 
while helping someone, we should keep some sensitive soft issues in mind.
There has to be a charm and elegance while helping others. Check for the following aspects in you when you help someone:
-without having to be reminded too often
-helping at the right and appropriate time
-not talking about your help to others. Helping in silence!
-without making the person receiving the help feel small or obliged to you.
-willingly and spontaneously with a smile
-not talking about the help again and again
-without expecting anything in return
-giving more than what was expected
We may overlook some of these emotional issues which are very important and add elegance and grace to your help which cannot be explained but only felt – by the person receiving the help!

N C Sridharan
www.thetimefoundation.com
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