Helping Out

For some reason, I have always felt that there is this fine line between helping and service. I suppose they should mean the same thing, but the effect on me (my personal character) seems totally different. Service—helping out at church, joining Student Council, volunteering at the nursing homes. That is the stuff that we complain about, the stuff that seems forced and at times, annoyingly out of the way. Simply helping someone, however, is so natural. “Compassion will come forth as needed…simply because it is its nature to do so” (Dass 15).

This reminds me of a time I helped out a random stranger at HEB. A woman was carrying a huge bundle of balloons and was struggling to fight them into the backseat of her car. I rushed over and assisted her in stuffing them into the backseat and then closing the door. Wearily, she turned to me with an appreciative smile and said thank you. I could see the appreciation in her eyes and I could almost feel the change in my mood as I headed into the store. I felt elated and lighter. Happier.

Ram Dass discusses that “our choice of how to help may turn on personal motives and needs” (Dass 14), but I honestly think that it depends. Sure, it felt good to help out the woman, but even without the repercussion, I am relatively certain I would have helped anyway. Because I know that I would appreciate it. I guess it really does boil down to that one simple rule: treat people like you want to be treated. However, I get what he’s saying when he discusses that people want to be doctors to have that title and respectability. I’ve thought about other health professions, but they just didn’t seem like they would be as self-fulfilling. Don’t get me wrong, however. I love the idea of helping people. For a long time now, I’ve considered the idea of being a pediatrician or a cancer doctor. It would be so nice to touch these people’s lives and have a chance to help them recover.

Does that make me selfish that I want to make others feel better? I’m not entirely sure I understand Dass’ whole point of view about that. I mean, surely helping a cancer patient isn’t selfish. There’s the risk that the patient will die and then you will be left to deal with the pain of losing that person and the pain of the people that person left behind. However, you were there and you made that much difference—which could have meant the world to these people even though you got hurt in the process.

I get worried reading too into the whole helping people thing. I like the idea that helping is just natural. It is something that comes with being a person—or an animal for that matter. The dolphin surely didn’t have much to gain from helping out the drowning scuba diver. Dolphins are harmed by people all the time and even hunted, so helping was the last thing that should have been on its agenda. However, the dolphin “was smiling” (Dass 4). It wanted to reassure and help not because it would gain from the experience, but because the diver would.

And it’s true: I do recall images of a place or circumstance “where going out of [the] way was hardly out of the ordinary” (Dass 8). And it still should be. I don’t mind going a little out of the way for people every now and then. And clearly those little actions can make so much difference. If we all did a little bit every day, it could mean so much—but if only some people help a lot and some don’t at all, it’s almost a lost cause. I have faith that people will continue to be friendly and helpful no matter how much changes in our society. And we will see that the people we are helping are not the only ones that leave that situation with a good feeling inside.