How Can We Provide Support?

These are just a small number of the questions I continue to ask myself as someone who has found themselves in the wellness / self help / coaching space. I often struggle with how to show up in this space because I both know how helpful it can be and also how not so helpful it can be. I often find similar language, processes, and structures in this space are just repackaged rules and regulations under the guise of empowerment and self help that I have been trying to get out of my whole life.

If I don't follow or lives up to these rules, am I a failure? Is this arena just another constricting box trying to make people fit into rigid and predetermined boundaries? Can we provide space and advice and helpful support without making them try to be anything other than authentically themselves - whatever that may be, however they may shift day to day? Can we support, show up for, and encourage without a list of DOs and a list of DONTs?

I share these questions for anyone who might find themselves asking similar ones and I'll continue to sit with them and see what comes up for me as I remain present to the ever-shifting dynamics of my life.

• Can we help others without guilt or shame?

• Can we empower others without creating shortcoming or weaknesses to overcome?

• Can we assist in making a shift or change without people feeling “less than” during the process?

• Can we provide advise or expertise without becoming the “expert” in someone else’s life?

• Can we provide support outside the binary of DO this - DON’T do this?