Why is it so difficult to ask for help?

This is a brilliant article by Michael Bungay Stanier, an Australian coach who lives and works in Canada. I found the article very useful -- I tend to avoid asking for help, but when I do, I wonder why it took me so long. When I first saw the article, I knew I probably should read it, but I did so bedgrudgingly -- I'd just worked a 12-hour day, and at first, it seemed like an awfully long article. But I quickly realized that the questions were just what I needed. I knew that much of the pain in my life is based in being "stuck" -- when I just can't get moving on critical work and life projects. Michael's mission is to help people "get unstuck and get going." His questions required me to really think (which is kind of painful at the moment), but I have to admit, they helped me see things differently. In this case, they helped me realize that sometimes, I really do need to ask for help.

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One of the ways I've been described is a "solo-preneur". When I first heard the term, I loved the title: I had visions of myself striding into the business jungle, machete in hand, the noble hero cutting a path through impenetrable undergrowth and finding the source of the Nile or the business equivalent of such a prize...

Now I realize there's an inherent flaw tangled up in that description: it's impossible to be successful by yourself. Even though our culture tends to celebrate the individual – in recent weeks we've had the Winter Olympics and the Oscars, both events primarily focused on solo success – the truth is no one does it by themselves.

I know that I'm an on-going victim of this "Superman Syndrome", and recently I've been asking myself why I find it hard to ask for help. Here are five points of uncertainty that I've found, the drivers behind them, and the powerful questions that can open things up:

1. I don't know what to ask for

I don't know what success is for this project

• If you "fast forward" 30 days, what would success look like?
• If you "fast forward" 90 days, what would success look like?

I don't know what my "genius work" looks like

• What, for this project, can you and you alone do?
• What's left?

2. I do know what to ask for, I just don't want to ask

I don't want to lose control.

• What don't you trust about others?
• What don't you trust about yourself?
• What's the price you pay for keeping control?

I want all the credit.

• What's the cost of taking all the credit?

I like the struggle.

• How does being in 'the struggle' reinforce your self image?
• How is it a comfort zone for you?
• What's the cost of continuing to struggle?

3. I do know what to ask for, I don't know who to ask

I don't know how to start

• Who do you know?
• Who do they know?
• I don't know what to say?
• What's the simplest thing to say?
• What would you say if you had no fear?

4. I do know who to ask, I'm afraid that they'll say no

I'm afraid of rejection

• When someone says no, what do you think that says about you?
• Is that true?
• What are reasons, other than they don't like you, that are behind that no?
• When someone asks you for help, what do you typically do?

5. I do know who to ask, I'm afraid that they'll say yes

I'm afraid that I'm imposing on them

• How are you protecting them?
• What's the lie here?

I'm afraid I'll be obligated

• What might you owe?
• What if "obligated" was reframed as creating a relationship with someone"?

I'm afraid of being successful

• What does success look like?
• What are you afraid of?
• What's the cost of "playing small"?

"Perhaps everything terrible is in its deepest being something helpless that wants help from us."Rainer Maria Rilke

Michael Bungay Stanier helps people, teams and organizations to get unstuck and get going on the stuff that matters. He is the author of Get Unstuck & Get Going ...on the stuff that matters, a self-coaching tool endorsed by leaders in the coaching and training professions, and creator of The Eight Irresistible Principles of Fun, a Flash movie that's taken the internet by storm. He is the 2006 Canadian Coach of the Year. You can find out more at his web site, Box of Crayons.