Table of Contents
The Pattern I Didn’t Notice
Growing up in a nice but stiff-upper-lip British household where personal thoughts and feelings rarely got encouraged for a sensitive kid like me, I developed a hunger for authentic communication early. By age seven, I already preferred direct, honest connection over social games or expected scripts. That hunger shaped everything that followed.
For most of my adult life, I’ve found myself alongside people facing significant challenges. Not because I sought it out deliberately, but because when someone needed help – genuine, practical help, not performative concern – I showed up.
In my twenties, I lived with and cared for my quadriplegic boss/roommate in the US – helping with daily tasks, learning what practical support actually looked like versus what people assume it looks like. My best friend in the UK was totally blind; we met on a train at night with his guide dog, and he became one of the most insightful people I’ve known – worked as a counselor, saw more clearly than most sighted people I’ve met.
When my father had a stroke after previous heart surgery and prostate cancer, I left LA to return to the UK for moral support. When my girlfriend and her young daughter needed help navigating life in Japan, I followed them there and spent twenty years teaching, supporting, being part of their team.
I’ve always known this about myself, though I’ve sometimes wondered if it’s genuine service or just a comfortable way to avoid braver, more ambitious paths. What I can say is that it’s often felt right – more right than pursuing “cooler” alternatives that never quite appealed to me.
Have you ever followed a path that felt right even when it didn’t look impressive from the outside?
What Pain and Struggle Qualify You to Understand
Here’s what I’ve learned: the struggles you’ve faced don’t just mark you – they qualify you to sit with others facing similar challenges in ways people who haven’t been there simply can’t.
When my wife left Japan last year after twenty years together, the grief was profound. But that experience sharpened my awareness of others carrying quiet losses. I could recognize the particular weight someone carries when a major relationship ends, when the daily routines suddenly have a person-shaped hole in them.
When a student came to English class just two days after his mother’s passing – her body still at home according to Japanese custom – we had a conversation that wouldn’t have been possible before my own losses. He shared a memory about an out-of-body experience his mother had years earlier during a hospital stay. We talked about grief, about presence, about the strange territory between life and death. Tears came, but we navigated it together. His firm handshake at the end said what words couldn’t.
I wasn’t trained for that moment. My qualification was simply having sat in similar territory myself.
What have your struggles qualified you to understand that others might not?
The Reciprocal Nature of Helping
There’s something people don’t talk about enough: helping others helps us too. Not in a selfish “I feel good about myself” way, but in a fundamental “this gives my pain meaning” way.
After my wife left, focusing on my students’ growth, my colleagues’ needs, the practical work of teaching and farming – these things kept me moving forward when grief could have paralyzed me. There’s a balance between processing your pain and functioning through it—both matter, just at different times. Working alongside others, focusing on their challenges, created space for my own healing in ways that self-focus never could have.
My mother is now in a care home, lost to dementia. My father visits her despite the heartbreak of her not recognizing him. Watching his quiet devotion while dealing with my own thoughts about losing her presence has taught me something: service isn’t just about the person you’re helping. It’s about who you become while helping them.
When has helping someone else actually helped you process your own struggles?
The Awkward Territory of Being Needed
Here’s the uncomfortable truth I’m wrestling with: there’s a difference between showing up when needed and needing to be needed. Between genuine service and avoiding your own path by focusing on others’ needs.
I left LA for my father. Followed my girlfriend to Japan. Spent twenty years supporting her family’s journey. Now I’m considering returning to the UK again for my father as he ages alone. Is this service? Or is this a sophisticated way of not building my own life?
I genuinely don’t know. Maybe it’s both. Maybe showing up for people IS my path, even if it doesn’t look like traditional ambition or success. Maybe the fact that I’m questioning it means I’m aware enough to keep it healthy.
What I do know: when you’ve been through difficulty, you develop an antenna for others’ pain. You can spot the person struggling in ways others miss. You know what actual support looks like versus performative concern. Your credentials aren’t a degree or training – they’re the scars that prove you’ve been in similar territory and survived.
Do you sometimes wonder if helping others is service or avoidance?
The Hard-Won Experience Your Pain Has Taught You
The struggles you’ve faced – loss, illness, betrayal, failure, disappointment – didn’t just hurt you. They educated you in ways nothing else could.
You know what it feels like when someone offers platitudes versus when they actually listen. You understand the difference between someone wanting to fix you and someone willing to just sit with you in the mess. You’ve learned which support actually helps and which makes things worse.
That knowledge qualifies you to help others in specific ways. Not everyone. Not in all situations. But in the particular territory where your pain intersects with someone else’s need.
My experience with loss means I can sit with a grieving student without needing to make it better or rush past the discomfort. My time caring for my quadriplegic boss taught me practical patience and what dignity looks like when someone needs physical help. My blind friend showed me that limitation in one area often means heightened perception in others.
These aren’t things you learn from books or training. They’re hard-won understanding from actually being there.
What has your pain taught you that could help someone else?
The Permission to Use Your Struggles
Maybe you’re carrying pain right now and wondering what possible good could come from it. Maybe you’ve been through difficulty and feel like it just damaged you without any redemptive purpose.
Here’s what I’m suggesting: your struggles have qualified you to help others in ways you might not recognize yet. Not because you’re supposed to turn pain into some inspirational story. Not because suffering makes you noble. Simply because you’ve been somewhere others are going, and that experience matters.
You don’t need formal training to listen to someone going through what you’ve survived. You don’t need credentials to offer practical help based on what actually helped you. You don’t need to have it all figured out to sit with someone in their uncertainty.
Your pain has taught you things. Those lessons have value for others, even if you’re still processing them yourself.
What would it look like to let your struggles qualify you rather than just define you?
The Ongoing Question
I’m potentially facing another version of this pattern – returning to the UK to help my aging father after building a life in Japan for twenty years. Part of me wonders if this is my final chapter of showing up when needed. Another part wonders if I’m avoiding building something of my own by always responding to others’ needs.
But maybe the question isn’t “service or avoidance?” Maybe it’s recognizing that showing up for people, being alongside them in difficulty, helping when you can – maybe that IS the thing I’m building, even if it doesn’t look like traditional success or ambition.
What I know for certain: the experiences I’ve faced have qualified me to help others in specific ways. The losses, the caregiving, the showing up despite personal cost – none of it was wasted. It taught me things that matter.
Maybe your struggles have done the same for you, even if you haven’t recognized it yet.
What has your pain qualified you to understand or do? Have you found yourself alongside people facing challenges similar to yours? How do you distinguish between genuine service and avoiding your own path?
Share your thoughts below. I respond to every comment, and your experience often helps others more than mine does.
