I want to help but you have to ask

I am different.  I have known it all my life.  I am different in many ways but one way in particular, and it's not being Gay which you might have thought.

I am different because I am capable of things that most people aren't.  Normally I would feel the need to insert self degradation here and praise the many skills of others but fuck that.  I am different and I am capable of many things that others aren't and all my life I have had to hide it and self censor myself not because I am afraid that others will find out but because I know that others will recognise it.  I have to hold back because of the expectation of modesty.  That expectation has been well and truly fucked out the window for this post.  I am confident in my abilities and that has been labelled cockiness on occasion by friends, by people I worked with, by teachers even and I have always felt like I have been made to feel ashamed of that and I don't like that because I don't see why I should have to apologise for being good at something and recognising it.

I know where my strengths are and I know what I am capable of doing.  I don't ridicule others for not being able to do things the way I can and I have never felt that someone was less than me because I knew something they didn't.  If someone can do something better than me my first instinct is to ask them as many questions as I think of in an effort to completely understand their methods and practices.  I seek to learn from others.

I have met people capable of incredible things and I have tried to learn myself and failed.  That failure is not what I hold onto in bitterness, if someone is capable of something that I can not do I can respect that and rely on them for their support if I need it.  If I can't do something myself but someone else can I will ask.  When I can do something that others can't I don't usually offer to step in or show them simply because I have been conditioned to think that this is rude and that the person I offer to help will take offence.  This is the thing this entire post is about, pride.  Why is it that pride is seen as such a bad thing?   It's considered one of the 7 deadly sins in Christianity, and abhorred in many cultures, societies and groups.  If pride wasn't seen as such a bad thing maybe we could learn to appreciate our differences and learn to help and be helped.

All this is born from my discomfort in the situation where someone is doing something and struggling.  Where I know how to do what they are trying to do, and where ultimately I don't offer unless asked, because I feel really uncomfortable offering help to people who don't ask for it because I feel rude, arrogant or condescending.  I want to help but you have to ask because if you don't ask then in most cases I won't offer and I hate that this is the way I am because I would like to be able to offer help to those who wouldn't ask but I never learned how to do that without feeling really uncomfortable.