5 Steps to Help Anyone with Anything

We’ve probably all heard snippets of Trans-Siberian Orchestra’s first Christmas album, Christmas Eve and Other Stories, but do you know the theme of that album? If you buy the CD, there’s a story woven between the song lyrics. God sends his tiniest angel to Earth on Christmas Eve to bring back a token of what people do to honor the birth of God’s son. The angel weaves in and out of many people’s lives that Christmas Eve and brings back many tokens, but the upshot is the best honor of Christ’s birth is the wish of one heart for the good of another. That’s all. Simple. Honest. No strings attached. No hidden agenda.

I really believe, by and large, the church is like that. We all want to help people. We really do. It’s been my experience (mostly), that people who really love Jesus, when you strip away all the pain and all the confusion and the deception and the fear they may be living in, really do want the good of the other person.

The problem is, we don’t know how. We haven’t been trained how to really help someone. So we default to the ways of the world, rules and control. So often the church is about sin management instead of practicing the presence of Jesus.

We often try to control people’s behavior with fear of punishment instead of training people how to steward freedom powerfully. God created us to be powerful stewards of the freedom Jesus bought for us on the cross, not powerlessly victims of circumstances, bound by the sin of ourselves and others.

I came across this video from Danny Silk, about how to help someone with a problem. This is the best instruction I’ve ever seen on helping someone solve a problem. And it’ll work for pretty much anything. It’s about 20 minutes, but so well worth it! I’ll summarize it for you in the rest of this post.

When people are stuck, they feel powerless. The beauty of Danny Silk’s method is it restores a person’s power. And it does so by asking questions. As you’ll see, everything’s done with questions. You don’t tell the person anything. You just ask questions. Ready to dive in? Here we go.

Step 1: Empathy – How Do They Feel?

This is where we build trust. We listen to the person’s story. We’re not looking for what they did wrong or what they need to do right. We’re looking for how they feel. And we parrot it back to them as a question. Does that make you feel betrayed? Or maybe, Did that make you angry? Or even something as generic as, Wow, that hurts, doesn’t it?

The beauty of it is, you don’t even have to be right. If you guess wrong, don’t worry, they’ll correct you. In trying to understand how they feel, whether we’re right or wrong, we communicate to them, “You matter. I’m trying to understand.” Everyone wants to be accepted and understood. They know we’re on their side. They can trust us. The walls come down.

Step 2: Empowerment – “What are you going to do?”

We have to realize this is their problem. We cannot solve another person’s problem. God created us all to be powerful people, taking ownership of, and responsibility for, our own problems.

Sometimes, when people are feeling stuck and powerless, they will try to get you to solve their problem. They often would love to get you in a parental role of telling them what to do, and then watch you try to make them do it. It’s then your fault when they don’t do it, and now it’s your problem, not theirs.

“What are you going to do?” is the most empowering question you can ask. It communicates clearly that there’s no confusion about who’s problem this is. And it reminds the person they’re powerful. They can do something.

Often though, they are still feeling powerless and overwhelmed, so they might answer, “I don’t know what I’m going to do.” And that leads perfectly into Step 3.

Step 3: Exploration – “What have you tried so far?”

This is another empowering question. It reminds them they have the power to do something. They may not be able to change their circumstances, but they have the power to choose how they respond.

You’re giving them value by expecting them to make choices and do things. You’ve taken it for granted that they’re powerful. And that rubs off, they begin to feel powerful again going through this with you. And you’re still trying to understand, which builds them up.

Step 4: Education – “Would you like to hear some ideas?”

Finally, we get to the step where we can recommend they take certain actions we think might be helpful. But we still don’t tell them do to anything. That’s not our place. Like Alex Trebek on Jeopardy!, we put our advice in the form of a question. For example, we don’t say, “You need to read this book.” Instead, we say, “Have you read this book?”

If we tell them what book they need to read, even if it’s true, we’re re-lapsing back into control. They will often immediately get defensive and tell you why it won’t work before they’ve even read it. But if you ask, they have all the power. You’re acknowledging it’s ok if they don’t read it. It’s just an idea; it’s their choice, with no pressure.

We don’t just start telling them what they need to hear, as tempting as that is, especially when we know we’re totally right. Instead, ask permission. “Can I share something that’s helped in my life?” Now you’re not preaching at them, they’ve asked for the information. You’re helping them feel powerful again. They can say, “Yes I want to hear” or “No I don’t”.

Step 5: Empowerment – “What are you going to do?”

Yeah, I know, we did this step already. But that’s the empowering thing about this process. We always come back to, “What are you going to do?” This is their problem, and they have the power to do something about it. We’ve put out effort understanding how they’re feeling, we’ve explored what’s worked in the past and what hasn’t, we’ve given them our ideas (if they’re open to it), and now it’s up to them, as a powerful person, to choose what they are going to do about their problem.

We can be part of the solution. We can ask, “Do you want me to help you by giving you a ride to the garage?” They take us up on it or not. Being powerful doesn’t mean they have to solve the problem all by themselves. But they need to drive the solution and own responsibility for the outcome, not blame somebody or something else.

Jesus So Did This.

This method really helped me understand why Jesus asked such seemingly stupid questions. I mean, for the Lord of all the Universe, there are times when he just seemed really dense.

Like when Jesus walks up to a blind guy and asks, “What do you want me to do for you?” (Mark 10:46-52) Really Jesus? The guy’s blind, you have to ask?!? What did Jesus expect him to say? “Yeah, I’m blind and all, but really Jesus I was hoping you’d help me change the oil in my camel.”

Or how about when Jesus walks up to an invalid of 38 years at the pool of Bethesda, where all the sick people go to get well, and asks him, “Do you want to get well?” (John 5:1-15). “No, Jesus, I’m just laying here by the pool working on my suntan. Can you flip me over? It’s time to do my back.”

The truth is, of course Jesus knew what these people needed. But he valued them as powerful people by letting them choose it. He didn’t try to control them and force them to accept what they needed. We need to do the same.

This sounds like tremendous fun to me. I love helping people. How about you? Are you game? Has someone done this for you? How have people either empowered you or controlled you into powerlessness? How did that make you feel? Tell us your story in the comments. And please share if this post would bless someone else.