is unsolicited attempts to help someone else a waste of time

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i think so.

there are some exceptions. if your child or spouse joined a cult, you would do everything you can to pull them out. but i am talking about friends rather than family.

my belief: if a person does not have a determination to change, you are wasting your time trying to keep helping them. and do not continue helping them until they ask for it.

situations such as a person being an relationship where they are being manipulated by the other person who, by some misfortune, they love, or someone who is refusing to look for work and not making something of themselves, or someone who got sucked into a cult, or multilevel marketing scheme or something along those lines.

i could politely tell the person that they are in a situation that will eventually cause them harm, but thats all one can do, in many cases.

but when the person is sucked into their routine and may be too stubborn to listen to the other side of why they may be making a mistake. you could remind them again and again, but at a certain point, its their problem, and not yours.

in my experience, and the experience of those i know, any attempt to give unsolicited help to people (no matter how badly you think they need it) is equivalent to just putting hours and hours of your time in a hole.

of course, i'm not saying always or never. and my personal views and experiences arent the ultimate truth to this subject.

your thoughts?

Well in my experiance the worst thing to do to a friend or family member you care about is give up on them......I mean if they don't change and blatently refuse to acknowledge the have a friend/family member trying to help them and are violent or hateful towards the friend of family member then yeah it kind of does become their problem.

However I could use the example of my depression....yeah sometimes I get so low no amount of advice can really bring me out of it......but it helps if there is someone there in support even if they cannot change how I feel. but that is just my opinion.....I can't imagine what I would do if everyone who cares about me just decided it was worthless to waste anymore time trying to help.

The way I look at it is like this, a Bible verse says it well.

You're right. Some people are toxic and just drain your energy, you need to preserve yourself in these situations by taking several steps back from the person, but still letting them know you are there for them.
There is a saying "You can take a horse to water but you cannot make him drink"; meaning that you can help people up to a certain point, but you can't help them completely unless they want to help themselves.

P.S. I read in "Men are from Mars Women are from Venus" that women are more likely to think kindly of unsolicited help than men. The book says that women would see the offer of unsolicited help as a caring gesture, you have seen they are in need and you have anticipated that they need assistance. This means you are a good friend and care about them.
Men view unsolicited advice/assistance as meaning that the person offering the advice thinks they are incompetent and too stupid to be capable of solving their problem on their own.

Depends how reasonable the person you're trying to help is.

I'm extremely reasonable, i know that with most things i can give a completely objective opinion, everything but myself. I, like most people, have a blind spot. I can never truly take a step back and see myself from the point of view of someone else. Whenever i do judge myself i know i have the tendency of being way too hard on myself. If i can be sure the help is genuine constructive criticism and i can trust the opinion of the person then im game, keep it coming.


Only a weak person wouldn't want to hear the truth.