I've already told this story on here but one time when I was in college this girl came up to me in the courtyard outside the library and she had a visual impairment and walked with a cane and she asked me to point her towards the trash can because she wanted to throw something away and instead of pointing her to the trash can liked she asked I said, "that's okay I can throw that away." and she very politely said "no I'll do it can you point to where they are." 

And I remember immediately having this moment of like, because she asked for help I assumed she was less capable than she was and tried to do too much and undermined her ability which was probably super annoying. 

It's interesting how being offered help in a way that's unwanted has this double bind of assuming incompetence and also outwardly appearing like a kind gesture and putting the person who then has to refuse help in a position of seeming rude. 

Complicated all the more by the fact that a lot of people don't ask for help and often silently want someone to proactively help them. And so how does anyone help anyone ever?

I guess accepting that social situations are inherently messy and people will hurt/annoy one another inevitably but that in a lot of cases the positives outweigh the negatives.

That's not a very exciting conclusion. 

Meaningful existence beyond survival is play and everything else is ego.