My problem with “only you can help yourself”

One can do drugs to help himself, or even kill himself.
And people say “only you can help yourself”
My mother said that. That’s how much she truly cares about me

I'm sorry for what happen to you. I can relate that. Mostly I deal with my problem alone. I'm barely gotten help by anyone.

Sometimes, I think the phrase is wrong. It is not, "only you can help yourself". The right one is, "only you who willing to help yourself". It's sad and suck, but it's the truth.

I'm sorry if my opinion let you down. I only want to say, keep going on and do your best.

I hate this phrase as well. There are some people who need to be put on their feet first before they know how to help themselves.

How the hell should I be able to help myself if most of the time I can't trust my judgement? If my obsessions and malignant thoughts are so engrained into my personality that I can't see things objectively? I have no idea how to "change" my attitude or habits – and all psychologists say in the end when we reach the crucial point is "Keep trying".

I'm sorry, but I tried for four years and everything stayed the same.

I think the phrase "only you can help yourself" could be interpreted in a more positive light. Sure, some people require medications, the help of a psychiatrist and/or therapist, and even hospitalization. There is nothing wrong with receiving assistance from others when you need it. But it does have to be the individual (most of the time, there are exceptions when the individual is so ill that help needs to be forced upon them at first) who decides to seek out assistance, and in that sense it is only they who can help themselves.

There is a big difference between using the sources available to us such as medication, doctors, exercise, meditation, etc, and then just hoping that someone or something will come along to save us. Unfortunately in this world, that just doesn't happen. We are responsible for putting in the leg work, so to speak.

If I ever could have helped myself, I would have done so a very long time ago. My favorite illustration is the one about trying to pull oneself up by the bootstraps...and the result was that I could only ever just tip my own nose right back into the mud. So when I found myself stuck at the bottom of a slimy pit, I had to drop the shovel and call out for help.

'Helping oneself' also means asking for assistance when it is needed. Shame & Embarrassment are useless emotions.

As in something like "Please 'assist' me (by (or while) allowing me believe I am actually (quite capable of or responsible for) helping myself)?" I have never heard of any medical doctor ever suggesting any such thing, and neither have I ever found myself any more capable in any other area.

I'm glad this topic was brought up.

"Only you can help yourself" is such a lie.

Yes, we need to put the effort to be a better person. But we need the help of others in order to be successful in life. For example:

- Oprah Winfrey had the help and support of wealthy men in order to get her own show.
- Bill Gates had the help of rich investors so he can start his own company.
- Many contestants on American Idol, and all these competitive TV shows, have armies of people supporting them.

I find it funny how every successful person walks around as if they "did it all" completely by themselves. When in fact they have a support system so big that it can fill a baseball stadium.

My psychologist has said....I provide the teaching but if you don't do the homework & the work it takes to put the skills into practice in your own life you will NEVER get better.

I was working hard in the 2 years of intensive group DBT I had with her. When that finished & she became my private psychologist & we could just sit & talk that was when she commented about progress & wellness comes when we do the work. T's can talk, pdocs can give meds but if we aren't the ones that change what isn't working in out life we will never see a positive change. It is teamwork.....teacher/student. We can change something if we haven't learned how but if we learn & do nothing we get nowhere also

I don't believe that expression/saying was intended to imply that no one can ever help you, in any way...

I believe it's meant to convey that that the individual is responsible for doing all the 'heavy lifting' when it comes to helping to improve their mental/emotional state. Others can support you, encourage you, and inspire you - but you have to do the hard work that is required to produce the significant changes in your life that you long for. No one else can do that 'heavy lifting' for you and no one else can produce those changes for you through their own efforts... You have to take on the primary role in helping to improve your condition - you can't assume a passive role....

I believe tha saying/expression was intended to inspire and empower....

I don’t think this phrase means you shouldn’t ask for help. It means if you really want to change and you really want to ask for help and you are willing to do the work, then positive change might come.

If you are passive and maybe aren’t ready to make change or even ask for help, then no amount of help will change anything.

We all know that for example active addict will have to want to get help if they want to heal. You can’t force it on people

I think that’s a response that some people use that have nothing else to say. I believe in it up to a certain point but i think many of us need support or a push in the right direction. Sometimes it’s easy to get stuck in a phase and you need a lending hand to pull you out.

I’ve been stuck many times and ultimately it turns out that i only have myself to rely on and that doesn’t go over well.

A subtle way of saying "don't look at me", if not just a really poor choice of words to say you're not putting your best effort on things (as if putting effort was really the key part of getting through things, which through my life I've been getting more and more skeptical).

Whereas it's true you can only help yourself sometimes on some specific tasks, it's ******** saying we could always do it (or when it's convenient to us), where and how should any effort be aimed, etc. Not only wrong but condescending (as if you never realized there's this concept called responsibility, you must be a freaking toddler to their eyes).

Others will like to judge how much effort are you investing on your problems or how much you should be able to put on them. "Only you can help yourself" is an euphemistic phrase telling you in your face that you're a pitiful, lazy and crippled monkey who's not really bleeding his parts for getting ahead of his trouble. No matter how "nicely" (or also "brutally honest", just another way of people for skipping insult permissions) put is that said, the meaning behind it leads to this perception of your situation.

This reminds me of the old Smokey the Bear slogan, "Only you can prevent forest fires."

No, no I can't. Sure I can make sure I'm not an arsonist but I can't stop the fires caused by lightning. That just happens. I'd be psychotic if I thought I could prevent those.

For me, "Only you can help yourself" is a way of laying the responsibility solely on the sick. And it minimizes community responsibility. Actually, YOU can help me.

YOU (my first psychiatrist who was stupider than a rock) could have recognized that me saying that everything was better after only two weeks of Prozac for depression meant that you should have checked for hypomania (which is what it was).

YOU (my stupid psychologist when I was in grad school) should have recognized that my forgetfulness and extreme lack of organization meant that you should have talked with me about the possibility of ADHD.

YOU (my next stupid psychiatrist) should have recognized that keeping your suspicion that I had BP2 to yourself and not putting me on a freaking mood stabilizer was causing me to damage my relationships.

My point is - can we help ourselves? Sure, if we actually know what the problem is and have the resources and the level of functioning to do so. But so many times other people shirk their responsibility to help their fellow human.

I suspect "only you can help yourself" is a spin-off of "God helps those who help themselves", and I have just done a little searching to try to find the origin of either. Bottom line? "Only you can help yourself"(with no thought or mention of "God") likely stems from "typically-American pragmatism: the can-do, self-reliant, nothing-is-impossible, rugged individualist American ethos." --Dave Armstrong

I can understand why some people might view a plea for help as an act of some kind of so-called "self-help", but then that clouds the matter of the source of the help that is actually needed and thereafter provided. As shared:

Many people like to refer to addictions recovery as "self-help", but here is the origin of virtually all addictions recovery:

"If we are painstaking about this phase of our development [Steps Four through Nine]... We will suddenly realize God is doing for us what we could not do for ourselves." ("A.A.", pages 83-84)

I was told I would have to pick up the hoe if I wanted to grow potatoes, but my doing so did not make me the provider of my food.