Philosophy of Helping: A Self-Reflection
It seems that I have always had an innate desire to help others. If I were to attempt to pinpoint what influenced and shaped this desire, I would say that my family and upbringing were largely influential, as well as the Christian values I was taught growing up. While it is difficult to ascertain how my personal value system could impact my role as a professional social worker, I foresee the influence to be largely positive.
Influential Experiences
Personal
When I was four years old, I learned that I was going to become a big sister. I remember my immediate thought being that I needed to protect my baby brother from bad things in the world. My role as an older sister and mentor likely impacted my view of the world in regard to a need to assist and protect those I perceived as vulnerable. More recently, I have been blessed as an aunt to two amazing nieces. While I do still find myself being protective, I have grown in my views so that I do not attempt to restrict my nieces’ freedom. I was initially a “helicopter aunt” but soon found that to be stressful and exhausting. This experience shaped me into relaxing and becoming less hands-on and high stress.
My other family members have also greatly impacted my personal helping philosophy by being role models to me. As a rule, I was raised understanding that family and neighbors helped each other, no questions asked. If someone was struggling, my mom would reach out and do what she could for them. Meanwhile, my dad taught me that it is okay to help strangers. I grew up seeing him help completely random people, like stopping to assist someone who was broken down on the side of the road or secretly paying for the dinner of a young couple with a baby. Helping others has been instilled in me from a young age. If I have the means to help someone, I should help them.
Professional
While I am still young and have had very little professional experiences thus far, I do feel like the jobs I have worked helped influence my philosophy of helping. For many years, I was a babysitter to my cousins. I believe mentoring these younger children shaped my understanding of how being a role model can be a form of helping. Not to mention, I learned that just being a positive force in someone’s life can be help enough, too.
More recently, I have worked as a ghostwriter in the positive psychology niche. Through my writings, I offer support and self-help tools that readers can use to improve their own well-being. While I do not get direct credit for my writings (and therefore do not receive fan mail or feedback), my supervisor has always been kind enough to share positive feedback from our readers. The understanding that I have been able help people through uplifting and encouraging words has been incredibly rewarding. It was this experience that solidified my desire to explore further education in the helping profession of social work.
Primary Beliefs, Values and Ethics
I was raised as a Christian, but that did not look like going to church every Sunday or reading verses from the Bible every week. Being raised Christian in my family meant that we valued family time, prayed over meals and before bed, and thanked the Lord for the blessings we had while praying for goodness on behalf of others. Being raised Christian meant living through Jesus’ teachings, such as being kind, generous and loving other people, especially when they seem hard to love. My religious beliefs have greatly impacted my philosophy of helping, especially when it comes to being empathetic, as well as offering help and kindness to people from all walks of life. I will not say that that has been easy to live up to, but I have often found that following Jesus’ teachings has been rewarding.
Regarding ethics, I have been impacted by American society and the laws of our land. There are laws that are put in place to protect citizens from harm, such as it being illegal to murder people and laws against assault. While it almost feels silly to point out that these laws have impacted my helping philosophy, it is true. If I had grown up in a society without such laws, would I value life and personal safety the way I do? It is hard to say, but I do believe that American laws have impacted my helping philosophy by shaping my understanding of ethics.
I have also been impacted by American values, especially the value of freedom and all people created equal. I remember learning about the Bill of Rights and the Constitution in late elementary schools, which I think says a lot because I do not remember much from those years. When learning about the beginnings of America, I held fast to the idea that everyone has a right to live freely and to be treated with respect and dignity. This ideology has definitely impacted my helping philosophy as I do my best to incorporate it with every interaction.
How Values Impact Social Work
Throughout my semester at Fordham University, I have been acquainted with the NASW Code of Ethics, which have shown to coincide with my personal philosophy of helping. I feel like this fact means I have already instilled many of the values that social workers also live by. Additionally, I think that the NASW Code of Ethics can help challenge me to not just be an efficient social worker, but also a better person.
While many of my personal values and beliefs can be beneficial in a helping profession like social work, I do need to keep my own biases in check. For instance, not everyone believes in God or Jesus, so I will need to be mindful not to explicitly bring those beliefs into conversation with clients. Also, it is important that I do not make judgements against people who have violated a personal value of mine, such as if I were to work in a prison and were assisting someone with a murder charge. Values and ethics can be incredibly helpful and powerful in a helping profession, but if we are not mindful about how we use them, we could do more harm than good.
Why Social Work
Overall, I feel that my upbringing and innate desire to help others has shaped me for a life dedicated to helping others. While my initial idea was that I could be helpful by becoming a psychologist, I found that I was more interested in the pathways that social work had to offer. I do not want to be a psychiatrist; it just is not for me. However, helping people has always been my cup of tea. Through social work, I can help people by empowering them to help themselves, I find this idea incredibly inspiring. That is why I want to become a professional social worker.
While I will spend much of my professional career discovering and combatting my own biases, I also believe that my personal philosophy will guide my choices in the helping profession as an effective social worker. I do not think my personal helping philosophy of today is wholly complete, and so I will dedicate my career to continue building on it as I build upon my knowledge base as a social worker.
