This episode is with Greg Allon, father of 3, Chief Operating Officer at a TV Production company, enthusiastic runner, blog writer and aspirational author

15 years ago he was diagnosed with malignant melanoma whilst his youngest of three kids was 9 months old.  And then a couple of years later, he started a spinning studios business with his sister and brother-in-law.

We discuss his insights on help from these life-changing experiences and how they have fundamentally changed his outlook on life. How they’ve acted as a reminder of how priceless the help from his wife, family and friends was during those tough times, and even now as he takes on new challenges including writing a novel.  

Some of themes we cover are:

• Children naturally ask for help, as we become adults we overthink it.
• Hierarchy of help - the multiple ways it can be offered, publicly or anonymously help, accepted and asked for
• The challenge help offerers experience in asking for help themselves
• The resistance to asking for help, and the reliance on your partner to be one’s ‘help crutch’
• The importance of asking for help for emotional and mental support as much as for practical, logistical support 
• The closer you are to your family and friends the easier to ask for help 
• Illness is more straight forward to ask for help, but it’s other less obvious situations that are nearly as valuable to ask for help, but it’s harder because it’s less obvious you need it.  
• The partner needs as much if not more help and support than the person who’s sick.  
• When starting a business how important it is consider what happens if it just goes, ok and to keep going only if you maintain your current job commitment.  Not just consider if it’s a failure or a great success. 
• Starting and running a business has inevitable waves of crisis and low points, where you’re verging on being desperate and forced to ask for help
• How one particular friend went way beyond expectations to help and find ways to keep Greg’s  business going
• Asking people for favours, help, advice and intros historically didn’t come naturally, but the harsh start up experience has now made that much more natural.  
• The more times you now practise asking for help and make it become a habit, the more proficient and comfortable you become
• The Benjamin Franklin effect - by asking a favour and advice can reframe an adversarial relationship to a trusting and valued one. 
• How giving help is part of self-fulfilment and as such can be considered the top of Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs  

You can contact me on:
Email: ashley@thegiftofhelp.org
Facebook: Ashley Usiskin
Instagram: @gift_of_accepting_help_podcast
Linked: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ashleyusiskin/