Maya is a prime example of how helping out can turn out to be more burden than a blessing.

I really don’t want this to come off as me promoting selfishness. I’m not. I think mutual support is exactly what all of us need in this day and age. Whether you’re on the giving side or the receiving side. More community and more solidarity can’t hurt any of us. What I am talking about, though, is what happens when help isn’t a mutual event. More of a one-sided, leechy situation sprinkled with entitlement. And that’s where I get to Maya.

Helping people always sounds so clean in theory. You picture handing over a spare key, sharing a couch, maybe cooking a few meals, then smoothly returning to normal life. In reality, half the time it turns into a long-term side plot where your home, your calendar, and your brain start carrying weight they never signed up for. The favor is real, but so is the hangover.  

The double-edged part is how fast support turns into management. You open your door to someone in crisis, and suddenly you are tracking moods, tiptoeing around tension, clocking every late night and long shower like an unpaid stage manager. Their problems start living in your hallway. You keep telling yourself it is temporary, while silently resenting how permanent it feels.