Quick Tips for Helping People with Disabilities

Hey there everyone!!

It’s fascinating -- the various ways in which persons with disabilities are regarded and treated in our society/culture. Throughout my life, I have dealt with several disabilities, friends and families with disabilities, and have noticed how thousands of people respond to those disabilities.

1. Don’t Over-Compensate for My Minimal Compensations

Yes, people with disabilities have some perks from governments, corporations, and even the general community. Some seem to believe that these “perks” more than compensate for the disability itself (verbally and/or energetically). It does not.

2. Don’t Treat My Blessings as Your Prerequisites

Only recently did I finally have the right to have a Disability Parking Permit (as a passenger in a vehicle). Some people expect me to remember to bring this with me all the time when I see them. It’s a new habit, and I may forget. But why am I so bad for forgetting?

3. Your Perceived Disability is Only a Subset of My Disabilities

Some try to relate by pointing to their challenges in life. However, it is rarely a fair comparison. Most examples given to me (e.g., not being able to recognize people, getting constant sun stroke), are only small subsets of the entire range of challenges which encompass my overall disability.

4. Help Without Doing — Be Empowering

Subtle distinctions make all the difference in the world. We don’t want sympathy, we want empathy. Don’t feel pity for us; instead, feel compelled to help us in an empowering way.

5. When We Help People with Disabilities, We Are Helping Everybody

Isn’t a chain only as strong as the weakest link? So when we help people with disabilities, we are actually helping everybody because we are having all of society be functional.

Check out all nine points and more visual quotes in the Complete Version of this article at
www.ordinarywords.com/help

Let’s love the world together…

Love,
[)anish /|hmed, blind visionary