How to teach others to help themselves

It is important to encourage the person to think about what they can do to feel themselves better.

In particular, ask them to remember what helped them in the past when they were experiencing the same state.

If the person has difficulty to remember, you can give some clues: “Is there someone who can help you?”, “What did make you pleased before, is it available now?”.

If the person cannot decide what can help them, suggest one of the methods of self-help. For example, tell them about the exercise for slow breathing or for reducing tension in the body.

To help another person cope with their problems, you can try the “stop – think – go” method.

Stop

• Help the person to make the pause and think about what problems are the most pressing.
• Help to use the circles of control and focus on the problem they can solve.

Think

Encourage the person to think about how they might handle the problem. Help them by asking the following questions:

• what have you done in the past to solve the similar problem?
• what have you already tried to do?
• is there anyone who can help to deal with the problem (friends, family or organizations)?

Go

• Help the person to choose the way to cope with the problem and try it out.
• If one method doesn’t work, encourage them to try another.

* Based on the WHO Guide (the name of the adapted Guide is being clarified)