Screw Helping Others

Part 2

Subject: Self-sufficient, Success

By Victor Antonio

In the first part of this article I stressed the importance of being able to help yourself before you can be in a position to help anyone else.  This may seem like a selfish notion, but it isn’t.  I want to illustrate what happens when you first help yourself before thinking of helping others.

Let’s suppose you decide that you want to focus on your passions and desires.  After some thought you conclude that you would be happiest opening up a pet shop for dogs called ‘No Bones About It’.   You pour your heart, money and time to build your business.  After several failures, misfires and false starts, you finally begin to get the hang of running your own business.

In your store you sell everything: dog food, leashes, collars, training cages, food dishes, doggy beds and so on.  Over time you start to get creative and add new services to your business like dog baths, dog walking, and doggy sitting.  Heck, you even decide to create a new line of clothing just for dogs.  All these little ideas and offerings are generating great business for you.  As your business begins to take off, you find yourself short handed and decide to hire someone else to help you run the business. 

At this point I’d like to ask you a question, “How many employees does your business help employ?”  If you guessed one, you’re wrong.  If you guessed two, the employee and yourself, you’re still wrong.  You business ‘helps’ employee many.  When you rent the facility for your business, you’re helping to support the owner.  When you buy dog food from the local wholesaler, you also help him stay in business.  When you take care of someone else’s pet because they have to go on a business trip, you help support their employment in their company.  Do you see how helping yourself, allows you the ability to help others.

This viewpoint may be a bit unusual but it’s reality.  The problem most of us have is the notion that helping others only means ‘giving’ them help (e.g., food, money, our time, etc.).  Giving people assistance does not solve their problem of subsistence.  Recall the Bible’s saying that if you feed a man fish he’ll eat for a day.  Teach him how to fish and he won’t know hunger.

Helping others help themselves is indeed a noble cause.  But I return to my original premise that you can’t help others unless you are in a position where you don’t need help. 

Helping yourself first seems a strange concept if not un-American.  But again, the reality is that it is American.  How can that be?  I want to reintroduce you to two concepts often used interchangeably but have very different meanings:

Selfish:  A person who looks out for themselves first and foremost without regard to how it may impact himself, those around him or society writ large.

Self-Interest:  A person who looks out for themselves first and foremost as long as it does not negatively impact himself, other around him or society writ large.

The essence of individualism in America is based on the irreducible primary of self-interests. If we all take personal responsibility and accountability for our actions, and focus on our own self-interest the beneficiary would be the individual and society. 

You can see how this works by referring to the example above of the person acting in their own self-interest to start a Dog Care business.  The individual wins and so does society.

But you may be thinking, “But how does that help the disenfranchised who aren’t in a position to help themselves and need a leg up?”  Good question.  The answer has many folds but I will keep it simple for the sake of being brief.  When a person opens a business, the money they make is taxed at a given percentage.  The owner of the building has to pay property tax.  Everyone who buys something at the Dog Care store has to pay a sales tax.  Taxes are collected at all levels from everyone doing business with the Dog Care store including the owner.  These taxes are collected by the Federal, State and Local level and are redistributed to help build roads (for people to get to work), schools (for education and long-term better job prospects), local charities and shelters (to help the less fortunate) and so on.

Do you see how helping your self (self-interest) is consistent with the American ideal and our compassion to want to help our fellow man or woman.

It is my opinion that people who want to help others but can’t help themselves are misguided.  Instead of seeking acceptance and validation in what they do, they try to compensate for their own shortcomings by trying to help others.  By helping others they forget, albeit temporarily, about their own pain.  They’re searching for self-worth by helping others.  They seek external validation from society who tells them how they are ‘a great human being’ for helping others.  Helping others soon becomes a sedative from reality. 

There’s also a noble element that these ‘helpers’ feel that gives them a sense of moral superiority. By minimizing or pushing aside the importance of personal wealth they feel that they are ‘above the realm of the coin’.  This transcendental mindset is delusional and misguided.   I’d like to see these very same people transcend the reality of paying their monthly bills.   Let’s see how long the gas and light will stay on.  You can’t pay your bills with a nobility card.

People who help themselves create more opportunities for others to prosper.  People who are too disadvantaged to help others, but still try, are just exacerbating the problem by not offering real solutions to people who need help.  The blind can’t lead the blind.  If you’re having troubles at home, on the job, making ends meet, you should not be offering up advice.  You can help others by first helping yourself.

Screw helping other people until you are in a position to help yourself first.  Then and only then, will you be in a position to help others.

Please share this article with a friend who may need a word of inspiration.

Copyright © 2005 by Victor Antonio   All rights reserved.  This article MAY be reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, as long as the author’s name, website and email address are included as part of the article’s body.  All inquiries, including information on electronic licensing, should be directed to Victor Antonio.