In the spirit of full disclosure, I’m not very practiced in reaching out. I’m more than willing if something is right in front of me and am usually at the head of the line when someone asks for assistance. But I’m not a self starter when it comes to finding out if you need a shoulder to dampen or your hand held.

My pattern has been to guard my privacy with a vengeance and, in the past, wrongly assumed that everyone else guarded theirs too. This kept me in the “mind my own business” department. The hard lesson I learned from having this pattern is that you can’t get help when you give the impression that you don’t need help.

Everything is not always AOK but many of us pretend that it is that way. It’s just another way to keep people away from our private sanctuary of suffering.

We have to reach out before someone can reach in and that takes a lot of bravery.

It takes an admission that you are vulnerable – a fate worse than death for people who pad themselves with privacy.

Vulnerability reveals a crack in our armor – a small entry way for others to reach in.

It’s been said that we come into this world alone and we go out on our own but I’ve discovered, in the space between, we’re not meant to walk alone.

Let folks know you have an underbelly. It’s a “reach out” revelation that will cause others to reach in.

All the best,

John