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A
candle loses nothing
by lighting another candle.
Erin
Majors |
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helpfulness
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If
a friend is in trouble, don't annoy him or her
by asking if
there is anything you can do.
Think up something
appropriate and do it.
Edgar Watson Howe
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People
who won't help others
in trouble "because they got
into trouble
through their own
fault" would probably
not
throw a lifeline
to a drowning
person until they learned
whether that person
fell in
through his or her
own fault or not.
Sydney J. Harris
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| Time and
money spent in helping people to do more for themselves is
far better than mere giving. |
Henry
Ford |
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| B.C. Forbes
The human being who
lives only for him or herself
finally reaps nothing but
unhappiness. Selfishness corrodes.
Unselfishness
ennobles, satisfies. Don't put off the joy
derivable from doing helpful, kindly things for others. |
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Often
we can help each other most by leaving each other alone;
at other times we need the hand-grasp and the word of
cheer.
Elbert
Hubbard |
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I
know some good marriages--marriages where both people are
just trying
to get through their days by helping each
other, being good to each other.
Erica Jong |
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The race of
humankind would perish did they
cease to aid each other.
We cannot exist without
mutual help. All therefore that need aid
have a
right to ask it from their fellow humans;
and no one who has
the power of granting can refuse it without guilt.
Sir Walter Scott |
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The
service we render others is the rent we pay for our room
on earth.
Wilfred Grenfell |
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In the time we have it
is surely our duty to do all the good we can
to all the
people we can in all the ways we can.
William
Barclay |
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The
truest help we can render afflicted people is not to take their burdens from
them, but to call out their best energy,
that they may be able to bear the burden.
Phillips
Brooks |
Even if it's a little
thing, do something for those who have need of help,
something for which you get no pay but the privilege of
doing it.
Albert Schweitzer |
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Whoever in trouble and sorrow needs
your help, give it to them.
Whoever in anxiety or
fear needs your friendship, give it to them.
It isn't
important whether they like you. It isn't important
whether you approve of their conduct. It isn't important
what their creed or nationality may be.
E.N. West |
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To
give pleasure to a single heart by a single act
is better
than a thousand head-bowings in prayer.
Sa'Di |
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I can't think of a
nicer feeling in my life than that I get from having
helped someone else. There's a great deal of satisfaction
involved in having given someone a hand when he or she
has needed it. One of the interesting dynamics about
helping that I've discovered is that in helping others, I'm
helping myself just as much as, if not more than, I'm
helping the other person, for I leave the situation
feeling good about myself, about my actions, and about
the person I've helped.
That's not to say, of course, that I think
we should help people just to make ourselves feel better. That would be ridiculous, and having self-interest as
your major motivation would undermine the helpfulness,
taking away the sincerity and the joy of helping. In fact,
helping someone else just to help yourself may even take
away the feeling of satisfaction. But this feeling is
very real, and sometimes when I'm asked to help,
especially if helping someone else is inconvenient, I have to remind myself that yes, there is something in it
for me, also.
But I also have to remind myself that it's
my obligation to help others. No, we aren't our brothers'
keepers, but yes, we are our brothers' brothers and
sisters. We're all members of the human community, and if
we're to become the people we need to become, we have to
help others. If we don't, then we'll watch people
steadily shy away from asking for help, and the human
community will grow more and more fragmented. And then
where will we be? I can be selfish and deny help, or I can realize that that's what we're here for: to help
others make their ways through this process we call life,
and thus make the world more pleasant for ourselves and
our children. People whom I've helped will be much more
likely to help others, and to give to others, and thus I'm
contributing to the well being of the world.
Of course, there will always be those who
try to abuse help, who will try to get me to do things
for them just because they want to shirk their own
responsibilities or do something else that's more
pleasant. We have to develop a strong sense of
discernment, for there will be times when the best help
we can give is a firm "no." We can't do
everything for others, nor should we try. That's
damaging to us, and ironically enough, it's damaging to
those we're trying to help.
As an instructor, for example, sometimes the
best help I can give is to fail a paper that's handed in
to me. Many of my students have gone through high school
receiving A's for average papers or C's for papers that
should have failed, and their instructors haven't helped
them out a bit by being so "kind" to them--these
students are now in college being given a heavy dose of
reality in the form of a harsh kick in the pants. This
kick could have been avoided if their high school
teachers had been a bit less "helpful,"
focusing more on the work at hand than the students' self-esteem
or feelings about themselves. When I get a paper that
doesn't meet college standards, the student needs to know
this, and I'm not helping by giving a dishonest grade.
People who work with alcoholics and other
addictive problems talk often of "hard love,"
and the concept of helping people by letting them hit
bottom. The co-dependent is a person who allows the
behavior to perpetuate itself by "helping" the
alcoholic by avoiding conflict. Which is better--helping
someone to reach a point at which they'll change
destructive behavior, or allowing them to continue that
behavior?
Once again, though, we need discernment--when
is hard love appropriate, and when will it be damaging? There are no easy answers, but
I know that since I've
shifted my focus from self to helping others every
realistic chance I get, I've found a great deal of
fulfillment in my life, and I wouldn't trade the tendency
of helping others for anything. Help can be as simple as
a compliment or carrying a bag of groceries, and it
usually doesn't cost a thing, but we certainly don't see
enough of it in the world.
tdw
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Our worth is determined by the good
deeds we do, rather than by
the fine emotions we feel.
Elias L. Magoon |
What do we live for if not to make
life
less difficult for each other?
George Eliot |
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In
this world we must help one another.
Jean de la Fontaine |
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If we
could all hear one another's prayers,
God might be
relieved of some of his burden.
Ashleigh Brilliant |
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Studies of volunteers have shown
there is a benefit to performing acts
of love for other
people. The irony is that it is actually in your best
interest
to be selfless. The things you do for the
benefit of others not only
make you feel fulfilled, they
increase your chances of living a long and happy life.
Remember that an act of love always benefits at least two
people.
Bernie Siegel |
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We live very close
together. So, our prime purpose in this life
is to help others. And if you can't help them, at least don't
hurt them.
Dalai Lama |
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Remember,
if you ever need a helping hand, you'll find one
at the end of your arm. . . As you grow older you will discover
that you have two hands. One is for helping yourself,
the other
for helping others.
Audrey
Hepburn |
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In
helping others, we shall help ourselves,
for whatever good we give out completes the circle
and comes back to
us.
Flora
Edwards |
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To complain that life has no joys while there is
a single person
whom we can relieve by our bounty, assist by our counsels or
enliven by our presence, is to lament the loss of that which we
possess, and is just as rational as to die of thirst with the cup in
our hands.
Thomas Fitzosborne |
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I've
been the person who got into trouble on my own, through
my own mistakes, and believe me, some help would
have been appreciated at those times. But I also know that
it's very important to learn how to deal with adversity on our own,
without someone else bailing us out whenever we get into trouble,
so therein lies an interesting dilemma--how do we decide when our help
is necessary and when our help is damaging? Are we going to let
someone else founder and lose their faith in people, or are we going
to become enablers by pulling them out of their own mess?
tom
walsh |
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As
Aunt Naomi was listing
all the things she was going to
do to help this person, her friend
stopped her in mid-sentence.
"Naomi, girl," she said, "you need
to resign as general manager
of the universe. You need to learn
that sometimes the best way to help
a person is to let them help themselves. Otherwise, they
never learn how.
And they are always going to make their problems your
problems."
Patti
LaBelle |
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Don't ask yourself
what the world needs. Ask yourself what makes
you come alive, and go do that, because what the world needs
is people who have come alive.
Howard Thurman |
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How wonderful it is that nobody need wait
a single moment before starting to improve the world.
Anne Frank |
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It is
because one antelope will blow the dust from
the other's eye that two antelopes walk together.
West
African Proverb |
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It is one of
the most beautiful compensations of this
life that no person can sincerely try to help another
without helping him or herself.
Ralph Waldo
Emerson |
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If
you help others you will be helped, perhaps tomorrow,
perhaps in one hundred years, but you will be helped.
George
Gurdjieff |
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On
his early morning walk along the shore, an old man noticed a young
woman
picking up starfish and tossing them into the ocean. As they
passed each
other, the old man said, "Pardon me, but why are you picking up
all those
starfish?" The young woman answered, "Because if I
leave them
stranded, they'll die in the hot sun."
"But,"
the old man said, "this beach is miles long and there must
be millions of starfish on it. No matter how many you help,
how can it make any difference?"
The
young woman looked down at the starfish in her hands,
threw it into the sea, and said: "It makes a difference to
this one."
Contemporary
spiritual story |
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Great opportunities to help others seldom come,
but small ones surround us every day.
Sally Koch |
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