The Unseen Rewards of Helping Others

Someone said “One of the most beautiful things we can do is to help one another. Kindness doesn’t cost anything.” Well, I disagree, wholeheartedly! Help is not free because it has a price. Although it’s free for the person on the receiving end it’s not so for the person on the offering end. Consider calling an emergency service for example. You don’t even pay for the telephone call when calling such a service but the service itself must absorb the cost even for your phone call.

Nothing in this world is free. Everything has a cost. Someone has to pay. The same goes for helping others. It is the reason why many people are not willing to help one another these days. Nevertheless, did you know there are unseen rewards to helping others? It’s the reason why I decided to write this post. Helping others may look like a thankless job but it’s not. Today I want to share with you five such unseen rewards of helping others. Next time someone asks you for help and you are not in the mood think about these rewards.

Helping Others Helps Retain Your Humanity

The modern business world is a demanding place. There are strict and constant deadlines to meet, expectations to fulfil, customers to satisfy, crises to deal with, problems to solve, etc. Even a housewife today has more chores to complete than ever before. We are all caught up in this rat race becoming more and more task-oriented and less and less people-oriented. As time goes by, we become less human and more mechanical. In the chaos, we can let our human nature slip away, become freaks, and not even know it.

Helping others on the other hand helps retain your humanity. It will cost you time and energy but in return, you get to break away from the chaos and focus on another human being for a few moments at least. It can nurture all the qualities that make you human. Qualities such as compassion, empathy, and understanding separate you from machines. Probably the reason why Leo Tolstoy said, “If you feel pain, you are alive. If you feel other people’s pain, you are a human being!”

Helping others Helps Discover Your Skills

Will you believe me if I told you there is at least one more skill in you that you still haven’t discovered? The late Myles Munroe once said, “The wealthiest places in the world are not gold mines, oil fields, diamond mines, or banks. The wealthiest place is the cemetery. There lie companies that were never started, masterpieces that were never painted, etc. In the cemetery, there is buried the greatest treasure of untapped potential. There is a treasure within you that must come out. Don’t go to the grave with your treasure still within you!”

Engaging in various activities is one of the methods you can use for discovering your untapped skills. For example, I did not know that I had the skill of writing in me until one day I agreed to help my team by writing an introductory text for an audio-video production they were working on. Although I had to make some effort the final writeup turned out to be quite good. Long story short discovering my new skill inspired me to start this blog and today I am also the official content writer and manager of my employer.

Helping Others Helps You to be Organized

The ultimate finite resource is time. Every one of us has the same “time budget”: 24 hours per day, 365 days per year — a total of 8,760 hours in a year. For most of us, 24 hours a day isn’t enough, not because we have so much to do in less time, but because we don’t plan and organize our time. Benjamin Franklin said, “If you fail to plan, you plan to fail.” I have noticed, however, being in a state of readiness to help others helps me to be more organized and that makes me much more productive.

I have noticed that I achieve more than I used to ever since I began maintaining an open attitude towards people who comes to me for help. I already had a schedule that I thought was packed. When I agreed to help someone, however, I had to find a way to slip it into my schedule. I am not an unorganized person in general, but the pressure made me a lot more organized than I already was, assess and rearrange my priorities as well as manage my time much better.

Helping others is an Investment in Future

It is said a starving boy once knocked on a door and received a glass of milk from the young girl who opened the door when he asked only for a glass of water. Many years later the girl fell ill and was hospitalized. Although she was diagnosed with a rare disease difficult to cure the doctor with much effort was able to rescue her. The girl’s next problem was the hospital bill. When she got the bill however it was a note underneath signed by one Dr Kevin. The note said, “Bill paid years ago with a glass of milk!”

I am not saying I expect something in return when I help people. The point is most of us can’t find help when we’re desperate because in the past we have refused to help others that were desperate. I am surrounded by people willing to help me when I need help because I have helped, and I continue to help everybody as much as I can. Therefore, whether it’s financial, physical labour, or just emotional support I have many people that I know got my back. Helping others is an Investment for the Future. I know because it’s tried and true.

Helping Others Helps Build Your Legacy

When a person dies, the imprint he or she leaves on the world becomes his or her legacy. It’s all about the depth of a person’s life, including what he or she did and the impact he or she had on people and places. At the end of the day, a person’s life story reflects his or her legacy. In a nutshell, your legacy is how people will remember you when you are dead and gone! Some legacies are rich and legacies are poor. Leaving behind a rich legacy is important because it’s an example you are leaving behind that the next generation could follow.

Someone said the greatest legacy anyone can leave behind is to positively impact the lives of others. Yes, whenever you add value to other people’s lives, you are unknowingly leaving footprints on the sands of time that live on, even after your demise. It’s been more than a year since my father passed away but the people, he helped still talk about what a kind person he was. That was his legacy. It can be my legacy as I walk in my father’s footsteps helping people whenever I get the opportunity. It can be your legacy also.

Wrap Up

Many people do not see the worth or significance of helping others. Some people say it takes time away from their personal interests. Others simply underestimate the positive impact of kindness. However, helping others in succeeding rewards you in ways that you may not be aware of. Helping others comes in a variety of shapes and sizes. Volunteering in shelters, donating money, and even assisting a friend or family member are all possibilities. These small gestures may appear insignificant. In truth, they have a cascading influence on your life. [Did you miss my previous post, “How to defend yourself against Revenge Porn?“]

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