Cristina Breshears: Look For the Helpers

I love the writing of Cristina Breshears. Always wise, heartfelt, and fiercely loving. May we all be the helpers our world needs. 🙏💜 Molly

"When I was a boy and I would see scary things in the news, my mother would say to me, 'Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping.' To this day, especially in times of 'disaster,' I remember my mother’s words and I am always comforted by realizing that there are still so many helpers, so many caring people in this world." ~ Mr. Rogers

Mr. Rogers' words have long been a comfort to me: Look for the helpers. You will always find people who are helping. He shared that kind of reassurance during some of the most terrifying times of my life: when my father was deployed to Vietnam, during the assassinations of civil rights leaders, and when RFK was assassinated. And I shared it with my own children in the aftermath of 9/11. Witnessing the helpers in every horrific situation reminds me that our humanity is still intact.

I watched the footage from Minneapolis where federal agents were deploying tear gas on protesters who were blowing whistles. An agent shoved a woman to the ground. A bystander filming immediately stepped in and extended his hand to help her up. In that moment, he surrendered fully to the human instinct to help; a beautiful example of how the boundaries between You and Me dissolve and we know, at our deepest core, that what happens to you happens also to me.

Alex Pretti, an ICU nurse at the Minneapolis VA hospital was a helper by profession. A helper by nature. He was trying to help someone who had been hurt. Witnesses say his last words were directed at the woman who was pushed to the frozen ground, “Are you okay?”

Another helper — a physician — tried to reach Alex after he was shot and was pushed away repeatedly. When the agents finally allowed him access, he saw they weren't administering CPR or trying to staunch the bleeding. They were counting bullet holes.

Mr. Rogers didn’t tell children to ignore tragedy. He told them to look for the rescue teams, the medical people, the ones running toward harm. Because seeing them reminds us that humanity is still intact and that we can choose to join them. We, too, can be the helpers.

But I keep thinking about what it does to a society when the helpers are treated as threats. Does compassion become a liability? Does our moral compass become uncalibrated? Will we be trained out of empathy? And is that the goal?

Today, I’m still looking for the helpers. And I’m grieving that they need protection too.

— Cristina Breshears