Delegating Work
How to ask for help from the unseen.
this is the seventh story from the emotional support series.
previous story: Overthinking as a Gift
from an early age, i learned — when i cry, no one’s here to help. no one’s here to pick me up. to hug. to comfort me. to say, it will all be okay.
for months, i laid in bed with others who cried. with others who received little human touch. we moved like parcels from place to place. for years, caregivers changed like seasons by the clock.
eight years of orphanage-hood swapped with a permanent-hood at foster parents.
at home, i learned fast, asking for help was something my mom never practiced with me. when she wanted something, verbally, she punched her demands in my face. and i did the same.
we had become masters of destruction. we believed, to get our way we have to lash out. like dynamites we explode one by one in the presence of another.
dad said in repetitive ways, “stop it now!”
tears were nowhere to be found. only high-pitch voice and hurt-filled words colored the air.
i thought often but rarely asked, “why don’t you talk to me like normal people do? you only demand, do this, do that. i don’t like it.”
pride ran the show.
surrender had no role in the play.
asking for help was a show of weakness.
we were stubborn twins with unhealthy ways of expressing ourselves of all the things we had a hard time feeling.
fast-forward to my twenties.
i had distanced myself from my parents to learn better ways on how to express myself. slowly, i hosed my self-lit fires through authentic confessions by sharing the things that scratched my mind, heart and body in discomfort.
i invited my friends to do the same. but from many, i heard, “i don’t want to burden you with my problems.”
but i loved to hear the inner workings of another. people’s authentic confessions served as a dose of medicine. i felt heard and seen. i felt held by their stories.
vulnerability disarmed my defenses.
fast-forward to my thirties.
i practiced asking for help every-single-day.
after travelling the world for five and a half years, with and without money, i learned that asking for help is what we as species are afraid to do.
but what if…
your sharing doesn’t have to be focused on helping other people, but merely the authentic confession of what you are having a hard time feeling.
— by matt kahn
and what if…
when asking for help, you are inviting others to remember their purpose as light workers; to shine their light of unconditional love just by helping you remember that you aren’t alone in your journey or experiences.
— by matt kahn
and…
even if others seem unwilling to give you the support you desire, just by taking the time to ask for what you need, you will feel more supported through your asking — even if the ego gets bruised by moments of rejection.
— by matt kahn
i had bottled up my emotions. i hid from them. and when i asked for help i felt a release every-single-time. the more i asked, the more connected i felt.
but i was a newbie in holding space for another.
but i felt the urge to help another. to provide support in a fly. so i stepped in. i disturbed another before they had finished sharing their story. i threw a lifejacket of words to help-help-help while i ignored their wish….
i just need to be heard. can you please just listen. it’s all i need right now.
i learned, there were things that others were able to provide. and things that others were not able to provide.
i heard an invitation to learn to hold space for myself.
when i met the dark night of the soul in december twenty-sixteen, i had moments, “i need help! i can’t do it alone! anyone?”
i then learned i can delegate work.
i heard in the corridors of self…
i am here to help. allow me to help you.
by then, i was good at putting my faith and trust in the external world but i was an infant in putting my faith and trust in the inner world.
i feared the unknown within myself.
even after three-years of explosive spiritual growth, skepticism ruled my mind. i couldn’t believe that the little me could heal my wounds on my behalf.
i needed to know all the how’s, when’s, and why’s. i craved for logic, for understanding, for scientific proof for mysticism. i wanted answers with no delays. i wanted to escape from the infinite low. i had no interest to waste my time.
and then i heard…
you don’t need to know how to heal. you don’t need to know what’s up ahead. i am here to help. allow me to help.
i then recalled my daily conversations i had with angles. by then, for two years, partly as an entertainment, i talked with the unseen coz it seemed so surreal. but i loved the parts on how i cracked up when i asked or thanked my angels for something that happened in my life.
i then recalled my daily prayers that i threw in the air. by then, for years, i had prayers for food, for water, for safety on the road. i birth prayers for whatever whenever.
daily i talked with the unknown.
but i had lack of faith, i had lack of trust, that something in me could help me too. i shut the unknown with disbelief until on day the following words slipped through my mouth, “i love you elsa. please help me. i don’t know what to do. i have tried it all but nothing seems to work. please help me. i can’t do it alone. please be my guide.”
while you seem to be a person dwelling in a universe, it is the universe that dwells in you.
— by matt kahn
i began to ask, “how may i serve you? what do you need right now” from myself.
i unlearned and relearned to hold space for myself in moments of change. to drink up the silence. to know less. to rest more. to ask less. to feel more. to talk less. to breathe more. to be patient.
i witnessed the depth of the unknown within myself. i watched my hunger of how’s, when’s and why’s dissipate in time. i bowed to change.
during the bridge construction of my parent-child relationship, i heard another mantra that went like this…
i call upon my angels, spirit guides, the universe, and my higher self to reveal how i am divinely guided, and to provide me with the greater support i desire now.
— by matt kahn
i then conversed the unseen from within and without.
all you have to do is have faith in their arrival, even if it seems to be taking longer than expected.
— by matt kahn
i wrote daily mantras to myself.
- dear great spirit / december 2016
- dear inner child / february 2018
in december twenty-eighteen, i heard and repeated…
i no longer have to do this on my own. i call upon my angels to help me find the joy of living and to help show me how supported i am.
— by matt kahn
i felt a major shift.
fast-forward to january twenty-twenty.
without shame…
i ask for help from others.
i ask for help from the unseen.
i don’t need to know what’s real and what’s not.
i don’t need to know who can and cannot provide.
i ask away. i have no breaks.
no matter what, i have faith and trust. i ask for help. i delegate work. i feel all that i do with openness.
but i am still learning how to ask for help, and how to help, and how to receive help from within and without. and to how i say, “come on your time.”
nowadays i feel how i have been supported by people and forces unseen throughout my life. i see how supported i was even in my early days when i cried in the crib.
i am blessed to have experienced time n’ time again how inner child heals my wounds on my behalf.
for me, that’s how…
endless spiritual busy work is replaced with authentic self-care. such self-care won’t guarantee specific outcomes, but it will transform your daily experiences — out of the brink of despair and into the light of true emotional freedom.
— by matt kahn
ps. here are today’s questions to your heart.
what if i don’t need to know how i heal?
what if i don’t need to know what’s up ahead?
what if i only reach emotional breaking points when i forget to reach out and ask for help?
next story: Everything Changes (coming soon)
let’s ask for help,
elsa
