Asking for Help: Small Group Workbook

Session Overview and Goals

This session explores one of the most universal human struggles: the difficulty of asking for help. We'll examine why reaching out feels so hard, understand the psychological trap that keeps us isolated, and develop practical wisdom for finding the right kind of help.

Session Goals

By the end of this session, participants will:

1. Understand why asking for help is difficult and recognize their own patterns
2. Learn the "need-fear dilemma" and how to break free from it
3. Gain a practical framework for identifying the right helpers
4. Take one concrete step toward building their support system

Time Estimate: 75-90 minutes

Teaching Summary

The Foundation: Growth Requires Relationship

There's basically no such thing as getting past your current limitations — in any area of life — without a relationship involved. The research across psychology, neuroscience, and medicine is clear: people get from where they are to where they need to be only when helpful relationships are in the picture.

Think of relationships as food. When you're in a good relationship, you "take in" things like wisdom, support, encouragement, and care. These nutrients become new abilities and capacities inside you — new muscles for life. Without the connection, there's nothing to download.

Why We Don't Ask

If relationship is so essential, why don't we just go get it? Several barriers get in the way.

Past experience. Many people learned early that help wasn't available — or worse, that asking for help led to criticism or shame. If you heard messages like "You don't need that" or "What's wrong with you? You should know that by now," you learned to stop expressing needs. You tried to become your own source of everything you needed.

The need-fear dilemma. This is a psychological trap: the more you need something, the more afraid you become to reach out for it. Here's why: when you're really struggling, the stakes feel impossibly high. If you reach out and get rejected, you have nothing left. So you stay silent — which makes you needier — which makes the fear even bigger. The cycle only breaks one way: by having a need actually met.

Bad experiences with "help." Some people have reached out and received terrible advice, broken confidences, or incompetent guidance. When someone who's supposed to help you actually makes things worse, why would you try again?

The Solution: Choosing the Right Help

Asking for help isn't just about courage — it's about wisdom. Not everyone who offers help is actually helpful. Dr. Cloud provides five criteria for evaluating potential helpers:

1. Understanding — Does this person actually grasp what you're dealing with? Do they get your situation, your pain, your context?

2. Intent — What's their motive? Are they genuinely there to serve your interests, or is there another agenda — a sales pitch, a need to feel important, a desire to control?

3. Competency — Do they bring actual skill or wisdom? Good intentions without ability don't help. In the book of Job, his friends came with plenty of advice but no real wisdom. Job called them "worthless physicians."

4. Character — How is this person put together? Do they have patience, compassion, perseverance? If your issue will take time to work through, you need someone who can stay with you through the hard parts.

5. Track Record — Have they done this before successfully? You want evidence they've actually helped people in situations like yours.

Matching Help to Need

Here's an important principle: the more help you need, the more structure you need.

If you have a small cut on your finger, you can treat it in your kitchen. But if you see bone and it looks infected, you don't go to a teenager on a skateboard for help — you go to the emergency room, where people have hung out a sign saying, "We're trained for serious situations."

It's the same with emotional and relational needs. Casual conversations over coffee work for lighter issues. But trauma, addiction, severe depression, and long-standing patterns usually require structured environments: a therapist, a support group, a recovery program. There's no shame in this — it's wisdom.

Discussion Questions

[Facilitator note: Start with easier questions to build safety. Save the deeper questions for later in the discussion.]

Opening Questions

1. How would you describe your relationship with asking for help — does it come naturally to you, or is it difficult? What shaped that pattern?

2. What messages did you receive growing up about needing help? Were your needs welcomed, or did you learn to suppress them?

Going Deeper

3. Dr. Cloud talks about people who try to "become their own source" — generating everything they need without depending on anyone else. Where do you see this in your own life? What does it cost you?

4. The "need-fear dilemma" suggests that the needier we feel, the harder it becomes to reach out. Have you experienced this cycle? What does it feel like from the inside? [Allow silence here — this is a vulnerable question.]

5. Think about a time you asked for help and it went well. What made that experience positive? What did the helper do right?

6. Now think about a time you asked for help and it went badly — you received poor advice, were misunderstood, or felt worse afterward. What happened? What was missing?

Application Questions

7. Looking at the five criteria for helpers (understanding, intent, competency, character, track record), which one do you most often overlook when seeking help? Which one matters most to you?

8. Where in your life right now could you use help that you haven't asked for? What's holding you back? [Facilitator: Don't pressure people to answer specifically — just naming that there IS an area can be enough.]

9. What's one small step you could take this week toward asking for help in an area where you've been going it alone?

Personal Reflection Exercises

Exercise 1: Mapping Your Support System (10 minutes)

Take a few minutes to honestly assess where you have support — and where you don't.

In each life area, name one person you could ask for help:

If you left any boxes blank, that's important information. Which empty boxes concern you most?

Exercise 2: Evaluating a Potential Helper

Think of someone you've considered going to for help with something specific. Evaluate them against the five criteria:

The person: _______________________ The issue: _______________________

Based on this evaluation, is this the right person for this issue? If not, who might be better?

Exercise 3: Your Need-Fear Pattern

Complete these sentences honestly:

"The area where I most need help right now is..."

"What stops me from asking is..."

"If I imagine reaching out for help with this, I feel..."

"The worst thing that could happen if I asked is..."

"The worst thing that will happen if I don't ask is..."

Real-Life Scenarios

Scenario 1: The Self-Sufficient Struggler

Marcus has always been the capable one in his family — the one everyone else comes to for help. He takes pride in handling things himself. But lately, his marriage has been struggling, he's not sleeping well, and he's been snapping at his kids. His wife has suggested counseling multiple times, but he always deflects: "We can figure this out ourselves."

Last week at church, an acquaintance mentioned he and his wife had seen a counselor during a rough patch and it really helped. Marcus felt a flash of shame just hearing it.

Discussion Questions:

• What beliefs about needing help might Marcus be carrying?
• What might it cost him to keep going it alone?
• What would need to shift for him to consider getting help?

Scenario 2: The Bad Advice Survivor

Jennifer opened up to a mentor at church several years ago about her struggles with anxiety. The mentor, though well-meaning, told her that anxiety was a sign she wasn't trusting God enough and that she should pray more and "just have faith." Jennifer left feeling worse — ashamed of both her anxiety and her apparent spiritual failure.

Now Jennifer's anxiety has gotten worse, but she's hesitant to talk to anyone. "If that's what Christian help looks like, I don't want it."

Discussion Questions:

• Using the five criteria, what did Jennifer's mentor get wrong?
• How might this experience affect Jennifer's ability to ask for help again?
• What would good help look like for Jennifer? Where might she find it?

Scenario 3: The Need-Fear Cycle

David has been divorced for two years and lives alone. He has friends, but they don't know how lonely he really is. Every week he tells himself he'll reach out — maybe join a small group, maybe call someone just to talk — but when the moment comes, he can't do it. The loneliness makes him feel pathetic, and feeling pathetic makes the idea of reaching out even more terrifying. So he watches TV alone instead.

Discussion Questions:

• How is the need-fear dilemma showing up in David's life?
• What small step might begin to break the cycle for him?
• What kind of environment might be safest for David to start with?

Practice Assignments

This Week's Experiment

Choose ONE of the following experiments and try it before the next session:

Option A: Name It to Someone Identify one area where you've been struggling alone. Tell one trusted person — even just: "I've been having a hard time with _____ and haven't told anyone." You don't have to ask for help yet. Just practice naming the need out loud.

Option B: Evaluate Before You Need Before you're in crisis, identify 2-3 people who might be good helpers for different kinds of issues. Run them through the five criteria in your mind. This way, when you need help, you won't have to figure out who to ask.

Option C: Seek Structured Help If there's a significant issue you've been handling alone, take one step toward structured help: research counselors in your area, look up a support group, or ask someone you trust for a referral. You don't have to make an appointment yet — just take the first research step.

Reflection Questions for the Week

As you go through your week, notice:

• When do you feel the impulse to ask for help but stop yourself?
• What story do you tell yourself in that moment?
• Where is the need-fear dilemma showing up in your daily life?

Closing Reflection

Dr. Cloud writes that "people who need people" aren't just lucky — they're honest about reality. Everyone needs people. The difference is whether we admit it and act on it.

This group itself is an act of asking for help. Showing up and being present with others who are also trying to grow — that's not weakness. That's wisdom.

As we close, consider: What's one thing you heard tonight that you want to remember? And what's one small step you're willing to take this week toward not going it alone?

Optional Closing Prayer

You may use this prayer or a moment of silence:

"God, we confess that asking for help is hard. We've learned to do it ourselves, to keep up appearances, to hide our needs. But you made us for connection. Help us to be honest about what we need. Give us courage to reach out, wisdom to find the right helpers, and grace when the fear feels too big. Remind us that we're not weak for needing others — we're human. Amen."