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Texas ISD School Guide
Texas ISD School Guide







Short Stories for Teachers

Asking For Help is Not a Sign of Weakness
By:Peter Fisher

When you find yourself in an unfamiliar situation, asking for help is not a sign of weakness. Yes, everyone tells you to 'stand on your own two feet' and take responsibility for your actions, but if you haven't experienced a situation before, how can you know what to do?

We're all guilty to some extent of wanting to sort things out for ourselves and not to rely on others, but at certain times calling for help is the best way forward.

You can picture the scene, can't you, of the man - and it is usually a man - driving blindly blindly around an unfamiliar town looking for an address he doesn't know. If only he would stop and ask for directions - help - he could save lots of time and frustration and get to his appointment on time.

It's obvious to everybody in a case like that, that asking for help is not a sign of weakness, but rather the sensible thing to do. So why do so many of us keep blundering on when help is available?

There are times when you know you don't have the expertise, such as when looking for a new job and needing to write your resume. If your pride prevents you from getting help and you just do the writing yourself, it may well cost you the opportunity you were seeking.

Similarly when you just started a new job, you often don't want to admit that you haven't got the knowledge to finish a particular task, so you keep going and eventually make things worse than they were. This may lead at worse to loss of the new job, or at best a diminishing of you in the eyes of the boss.

Yet, your new employer knows that you can't possibly have the knowledge that your co-workers have gained over the span of their employment and so would not look negatively upon being asked for help.

Now that you see that asking for help is not a sign of weakness but is the sensible and mature thing to do, you will also recognize the many areas of your life where expert help would save you time, energy and money in the long run. Making your life easier by asking for and using knowledgeable help is not a sign of weakness, but is actually quite a clever thing to do.

Peter Fisher is an Expert career Coach and Webmaster for http://www.Your-Career-Change.com where you can ask for and get expert help which is a sensible and mature way to achieve your goals.






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