Things to keep in mind, before you lend a helping hand
- For people who go through hardships, it's difficult to keep the presence in mind and make rational decisions to overcome their current situation. The supporter should keep this in mind first.
- The objective of the supporter should be to listen and understand these problems and provide solutions, advice or suggestions. Depending on the level of friendship/trust/closeness between the person and supporter, the supporter can provide one or all of these. This is the second thing that the supporter should keep in mind.
- Some people, even though how close they are to you, are not ready to accept support. Some people heed what you say, but do not act upon your guidance or suggestions. Therefore, your actions might not yield your expected results always. As a supporter, you should not be disappointed or discouraged by this. This is the third point to keep in mind.
How to help and support
The person who go through hardship will have one or more problems that they face. All these would have one or more causes. If you remove the cause, the effect would also cease to exist. So, the zeroth step should be providing emotional comfort. This will prepare them better to face the problem. Any battle won is won in mind first. This doesn't mean sugar coating the situation, but providing him/her assurance that you will be there to help, and you will be there to the end of it.
The first step is to analyze the circumstances and understand the causes of them. For this, the person with the problems should provide all the necessary information that he/she has over the matter. You should ask questions and clarifications, with the intent of understanding the problems.
The second step is to find out remedies for the causes of the problems. You can use your experience, instincts, other peoples' advice or any other means necessary to device solutions. It's important that your solutions should be morally correct and should not harm you, your friend who need help or any other living/non-living component of the society. (This doesn't mean that you should not take tough decisions. For example, not ending an abusive relationship thinking that the other party would be mentally hurt is such a scenario. You need to think that if the relationship continues, it will continue to harm the victim. If it ends, it will be good for both parties as one's harm is ended and the other is prevented from committing bad deeds.)
This is the most important part of helping, because the one with problem may not be in a proper mental state to make a rational decision. The solutions should be well thought out, considering all the possible outcomes of the actions.
The third step is to communicate the solution properly. Make sure that following are fulfilled at the end of this step.
- Person with the problems understands what are his/her problems.
- He/she understands what are the causes of these problems.
- He/she knows what are the solutions, and are these going to solve the problems.
- He/she understand what the possible outcomes, and what external factors will have an success/failure of the solution.
- He/she knows what are the backup/mitigation plans.
Once these are communicated, you should ask for their feedback on them. You need to take suggestions from them on these solutions. Ideally, you should get them involved in formulating the solutions. No matter how sound your solutions may be, they may not accept them. They may contradict your opinions. Remember, it's their life. You are not making decisions for them. You are just providing solutions for their current hardships. They have their freedom to accept it or reject it. Don't be disheartened. (Remember the 3rd point to keep in mind.)
If your solutions are accepted, the fourth step is to put your solutions to action. The initiator of these can either be the person with the problem, you or a third party. Give help yourself, help him/her find help and find outside help as necessary. Always followup on the progress. If things don't work out, evaluate issues and take actions, so that the solution ends in the desired outcome. Remember, it's not a leaner process. An action plan is always iterative, where improvement are made in each cycle identified by the feedback of the previous.
If your solutions are not accepted, the fifth step is to find alternatives. If alternatives are accepted, continue as mentioned in the above paragraph. If alternatives are repeatedly rejected, you will have to stop at a certain point. In such a situation, let the person with the problems device solutions on their own. If they are willing to accept help, provide them as necessary. Make sure that those solutions are morally correct.
(This is based on an article that I've written on wikiHow.)
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