Why Do We Judge People for Asking for Help?

A friend of mine recently asked someone close to her for help with a small task.

It wasn’t complicated.

It wasn’t something that required hours of work or special expertise. In fact, the answer could probably have been found on Google.

But instead of simply helping, the response was something along the lines of:

“Why are you asking me? You could have found the solution yourself.”

The task was small.

The help required was small.

But the reaction wasn’t.

And it left me thinking about something much bigger:

Why do we judge people for asking for help — even when they ask someone they trust?

When did “Can you help me?” become a question that needs to be justified?

Maybe the Question Was Never About the Answer

This is something we often miss.

When someone asks us how to do something, our first instinct may be to think about whether they could have figured it out themselves.

Could they have searched Google?

Could they have watched a YouTube video?