How to Support Someone Without Trying to Fix Their Problem
When someone we care about is struggling, our instinct is often to offer advice, find a solution or make the pain disappear. But truly supporting someone can mean resisting the urge to fix—and giving them the space to feel heard, understood and less alone.
What if helping isn’t about making it better?
I’ve gone through my fair share of struggles.
The challenges of building a business. Becoming a first-time mom. The grief of losing people I love.
And because my job is to help people, I’ve also sat across from hundreds of people as they’ve navigated struggles of their own.
Leaders trying to support their teams.
People questioning their careers.
New moms trying to find their footing.
Loved ones navigating the heartbreak and uncertainty of trying to conceive.
And something I’ve learned, both from supporting others and from being the person who needed support, is that our first instinct isn’t always the most helpful one.
Why we instinctively try to fix other people’s problems
When someone we care about is struggling, we naturally want to make it better.
We want to take something off their plate.
Offer advice.
Find the solution.
Reassure them that everything will be okay.
Protect them from pain.
These instincts usually come from love.
But sometimes, underneath our desire to fix someone’s struggle is our own discomfort with watching them experience it.
We rush toward solutions because it’s hard to sit beside something we can’t solve.
But supporting someone doesn’t always mean taking away their struggle.
Sometimes it means sitting alongside them while it’s there.
Not looking down at them from the other side, offering instructions for how to get out.
Not pulling them toward an answer they aren’t ready for.
But meeting them where they are.
Giving them space to say the thing they haven’t been able to say.
Asking thoughtful questions instead of assuming we know what they need.
Helping them understand what they’re experiencing and reconnect with their own ability to move through it.
There is a huge difference between saying:
“Here’s what I think you should do.”
And asking:
“What's this been like for you?”
The first moves us quickly toward a solution.
The second gives someone room to feel heard.
Sometimes people do want advice.
Sometimes practical support really does lighten the load.
But we don’t always have to begin there.
How to support someone without giving them the answer
I see this often with leaders who genuinely want to support their teams.
Someone brings them a challenge, and they immediately start solving it.
But when leaders always provide the answer, they can unintentionally teach people to look upward for solutions instead of building confidence in their own judgment.
A thoughtful question can sometimes do more than a perfectly packaged answer.
It can help someone hear themselves think.
It can reveal what’s really going on beneath the surface.
It can help them recognize their own resourcefulness, judgment and strength.
And this extends far beyond leadership.
It’s true in friendship.
In parenthood.
In partnership.
In grief.
In any moment when someone we care about is navigating something we desperately wish we could take away.
I’ve learned to pause before offering advice.
To listen without immediately searching for the lesson, the silver lining or the solution.
And to resist the urge to make someone’s struggle disappear.
Not because I don’t want things to be easier for them, but because their struggle doesn’t need to be taken away before it can be understood.
Sometimes a thoughtful question can help.
Sometimes practical support can lighten the load.
And sometimes the most helpful thing we can offer is simply our willingness to stay.
To say: This is hard. I’m here. We don’t have to figure it all out right now.
Sitting alongside someone in their struggle is not the same as doing nothing.
It’s allowing them to feel what they feel without rushing them through it.
It’s trusting that they don’t need us to rescue them.
And it’s reminding them through our presence, that they don’t have to carry it alone.
Ashley Marcinek is an ICF-certified executive, life and career coach who helps ambitious professionals find clarity, strengthen their self-trust and create meaningful change in how they work, lead and live.
