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Transcript

I’m Learning How to Ask for Help · Just Julia

• 0:00
  SPEAKER_00: I'm learning how to ask for help.
• 0:02
  SPEAKER_00: I used to think the hardest part of losing a job would be the applications,
• 0:06
  SPEAKER_00: the interviews, the waiting, the uncertainty.
• 0:10
  SPEAKER_00: I was wrong.
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_00: The hardest part has been asking for help.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_00: Not the practical act of sending a CV or writing a message
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_00: but what those actions seem to require from me internally.
• 0:21
  SPEAKER_00: They require me to admit that I cannot solve everything on my own And for someone
• 0:26
  SPEAKER_00: who has spent most of her life doing exactly that, it is surprisingly painful.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_00: There is something about asking for help that makes you feel exposed in
• 0:35
  SPEAKER_00: a way failure sometimes doesn't.
• 0:37
  SPEAKER_00: You have to say, I need something.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_00: I don't have the answer.
• 0:41
  SPEAKER_00: I cannot do this entirely by myself.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_00: Can you help me?
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_00: Even writing those words makes something inside me resist.
• 0:49
  SPEAKER_00: I have always been independent.
• 0:51
  SPEAKER_00: I have moved countries, built a career, solved problems and found ways forward.
• 0:56
  SPEAKER_00: When something went wrong, my instinct was usually not to look around for someone to rescue me.
• 1:01
  SPEAKER_00: It was to work out what needed to be done and do it.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_00: That has served me well.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_00: But I am starting to realise that independence can quietly become a trap
• 1:10
  SPEAKER_00: when we begin to confuse strength with never needing anyone.
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_00: A friend of mine lost her job some time ago,
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_00: and I remember telling her very confidently what she needed to do.
• 1:20
  SPEAKER_00: You have to put your pride in your pocket.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_00: Tell everyone you're looking.
• 1:24
  SPEAKER_00: Send your CV around.
• 1:25
  SPEAKER_00: Tell people exactly what you want.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_00: If they know someone, ask for an introduction.
• 1:30
  SPEAKER_00: She told me how difficult that felt, and I remember thinking she was being too proud.
• 1:35
  SPEAKER_00: Just ask.
• 1:36
  SPEAKER_00: Now I find myself in almost exactly the same place, and I understand her.
• 1:41
  SPEAKER_00: I understand that asking is not a small administrative task when you are the one doing it.
• 1:46
  SPEAKER_00: It is making your vulnerability visible.
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_00: It is walking up to someone and admitting that there is a gap in your life and
• 1:52
  SPEAKER_00: that you would like them to help you cross it.
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_00: That is much harder than I realized from the outside.
• 1:58
  SPEAKER_00: Recently, I found myself asking for something that, to me, felt very small.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_00: A reference.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_00: After years of work,
• 2:05
  SPEAKER_00: contribution,
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_00: relationships and results,
• 2:09
  SPEAKER_00: I thought that one of the simplest things I could ask for was
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_00: a letter acknowledging what I had done.
• 2:14
  SPEAKER_00: I asked, then I asked again, and nothing came.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_00: There is something particularly painful about gathering the courage to say,
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_00: I need this, and receiving silence.
• 2:26
  SPEAKER_00: Because the silence does not just leave you without what you asked for.
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_00: It can make you question whether you should have asked at all.
• 2:33
  SPEAKER_00: Did I sound desperate?
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_00: Was I asking too much?
• 2:36
  SPEAKER_00: Should I stop?
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_00: Should I pretend I don't need it?
• 2:39
  SPEAKER_00: That is where pride comes back in and whispers, see, this is why we do things ourselves.
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_00: But if I'm honest, this pattern did not start with work.
• 2:49
  SPEAKER_00: I recognise it from motherhood too.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_00: When I became a mother, I spent many of those first months trying to do everything myself.
• 2:57
  SPEAKER_00: My husband would leave for work,
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_00: and during my maternity leave,
• 3:00
  SPEAKER_00: I would spend the day alone with my baby, managing everything.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't want people in the house.
• 3:05
  SPEAKER_00: I didn't want to inconvenience anyone.
• 3:07
  SPEAKER_00: I thought I could handle it.
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_00: And technically, I did.
• 3:11
  SPEAKER_00: But when I look back now...
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_00: I'm exhausted.
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_00: Can you stay for a little while?
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_00: I could have asked for company, for food, for a small break.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_00: I could simply have said, I need help.
• 3:32
  SPEAKER_00: I wore doing everything myself almost like proof that I was managing motherhood well.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_00: But maybe managing is not the same thing as being supported.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_00: And maybe being supported is not evidence that we are failing.
• 3:46
  SPEAKER_00: I think many women are taught to become extraordinarily good at being
• 3:50
  SPEAKER_00: the person other people can rely on.
• 3:52
  SPEAKER_00: We organize, remember, anticipate, solve, take care of people.
• 3:57
  SPEAKER_00: We become the competent one, the strong one, the one who says, don't worry, I'll handle it.
• 4:03
  SPEAKER_00: Then life gives us a season where we cannot handle everything alone.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_00: A job disappears, a marriage ends, a baby arrives.
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_00: Someone gets sick, a business fails, a parent needs care.
• 4:17
  SPEAKER_00: We move somewhere new.
• 4:18
  SPEAKER_00: We decide to build something from scratch.
• 4:21
  SPEAKER_00: Suddenly,
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_00: the identity we built around being self-sufficient becomes the very thing standing
• 4:26
  SPEAKER_00: between us and the support we need.
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_00: I am feeling that now because if I decide to build something of my own,
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_00: I know I will have to ask.
• 4:35
  SPEAKER_00: There is no way around it.
• 4:37
  SPEAKER_00: I will have to tell people what I'm doing.
• 4:39
  SPEAKER_00: I will have to say, would you try this?
• 4:42
  SPEAKER_00: Would you introduce me to someone?
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_00: Would you give me feedback?
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_00: Would you share this?
• 4:47
  SPEAKER_00: Would you support me?
• 4:48
  SPEAKER_00: And for me, that feels frighteningly close to saying, please see me.
• 4:53
  SPEAKER_00: Please believe in this.
• 4:55
  SPEAKER_00: Please help me.
• 4:56
  SPEAKER_00: I think that maybe one of the reasons building something of your own is such
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_00: an emotional challenge.
• 5:01
  SPEAKER_00: It is not only about having an idea.
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  SPEAKER_00: It is about allowing other people to witness you trying.
• 5:08
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes they will support you.
• 5:10
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes they won't.
• 5:11
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes they will not answer at all.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_00: So what do we do then?
• 5:15
  SPEAKER_00: I am still learning but I think the first thing I am beginning to understand is
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_00: that asking and receiving are two separate acts.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_00: I can control whether I ask.
• 5:25
  SPEAKER_00: I cannot control whether someone says yes.
• 5:28
  SPEAKER_00: Perhaps part of becoming stronger is learning not to confuse somebody else's silence
• 5:33
  SPEAKER_00: with evidence that I should never have asked.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe I asked the wrong person.
• 5:38
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe they are busy.
• 5:39
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe they do not have the capacity.
• 5:41
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe they simply do not want to help.
• 5:44
  SPEAKER_00: That can hurt, but their answer does not have to become my identity.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_00: I can ask again somewhere else.
• 5:50
  SPEAKER_00: I can keep moving.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_00: I can keep knocking.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_00: And maybe that is what I am learning about life right now.
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_00: Life is not only made of the moments when everything works.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_00: It is also made of the days when you send the message and hear nothing,
• 6:04
  SPEAKER_00: when you ask for the introduction and it goes nowhere,
• 6:07
  SPEAKER_00: when you apply and get rejected,
• 6:09
  SPEAKER_00: when you show someone what you are building and they do not understand it,
• 6:13
  SPEAKER_00: and when you still have to get up the next morning and continue.
• 6:16
  SPEAKER_00: There is a kind of strength in winning,
• 6:19
  SPEAKER_00: but there is another kind of strength in continuing without proof that you are going
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_00: to win.
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_00: That is the one I am trying to learn.
• 6:26
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe you have always been the strong one
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_00: and you genuinely do not know what it sounds like to say, can you help me?
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_00: I wish I had a perfect formula for how to do it without feeling uncomfortable.
• 6:59
  SPEAKER_00: I don't.
• 7:00
  SPEAKER_00: I am still learning how to send the message without rewriting it 10 times,
• 7:04
  SPEAKER_00: how to attach the CV,
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_00: how to ask for the introduction,
• 7:07
  SPEAKER_00: how to say what I need without apologizing for needing it,
• 7:11
  SPEAKER_00: how to ask again after somebody has ignored me,
• 7:13
  SPEAKER_00: and how to accept a no without disappearing.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_00: Perhaps that is the practice.
• 7:18
  SPEAKER_00: Not learning how to stop needing people,
• 7:21
  SPEAKER_00: but learning how to need people without losing ourselves.
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_00: Learning that independence does not have to mean isolation.
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_00: Learning that being capable does not mean doing everything alone.
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_00: Learning that asking for help can feel humiliating and still be brave.
• 7:36
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe putting our pride in our pocket does not mean making ourselves smaller.
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_00: Maybe it means being strong enough to say, I cannot do this part alone.
• 7:45
  SPEAKER_00: Can you help me?
• 7:47
  SPEAKER_00: And then, whatever the answer is, continuing.
• 7:50
  SPEAKER_00: Just Julia.