Why Asking for Help Is a Strength, Not a Weakness

(air whooshes) (mouse clicks) (soft music) Headspace Studios. Hi everyone, I'm Jeffrey Marsh, your Oprah-endorsed guest host for the week. Welcome to Radio Headspace and to Tuesday. This week is about resilience as self-kindness. One of the most transformative shifts in my life was realizing that asking for help isn't weak, it's courageous. Today, we'll explore why reaching out is a powerful act of self-trust, and I'll share what I've learned about letting others in and how that simple act can change the way you see yourself. When I was younger, I was taught that needing help was a character flaw. In my particular case, needing help was about weakness, was about being unacceptable, about being unloved, and honestly about being the quote, unquote, "wrong" kind of man that I was supposed to grow up to be, like be powerful, et cetera. But of course, in coaching with women too, they're taught not task for help. Non-binary people, trans folks, everyone is taught asking for help is a weakness, and in the meantime, having community is the greatest power. Get invested in your immediate friend group, your coworkers, your neighborhood. That kind of fulfilling work is what you deserve and that kind of connection, so that that community is built, and when you need help, you have the support, that kind of connection is what everyone deserves. There was a dangerous bookstore in the town where I went to college, and it was dangerous because it was spiritual. I was raised Christian, and when I got to college, there was this bookstore. I went to college in Philadelphia and there was this bookstore called Garland of Letters, which I don't think is open anymore, but they sold posters, crystals, dream catchers, Buddhist books. And I was so thoroughly trained that that stuff was unacceptable, to be avoided. But my heart called me to the place, magnetized me to the place. But as soon as I stepped in and smelled the incense, I looked across the store. The very first thing I saw was a book, the cover was facing out, it said, "There is Nothing Wrong With You." And inside my mind started going, "Well, that's dumb. Of course there's something wrong with you, there's this, this, this, this, this, and this that's wrong with you." But my feet had already started moving toward the book. So my mind was yelling at me how there is something wrong with me. And my feet started walking to that book, I opened the cover, I read it right there in the bookstore. And in the back of the book was, "Hey, I run a monastery. Why don't you come? If you need help, we can help you, do a retreat, come to a meditation class." And I said, "Absolutely not. No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no." I kept myself from what has enabled me to survive as a person like me, a non-binary person in this current world. I...