How do you deal with someone who doesn’t take your advice but constantly asks for help when the advice alleviates the need to ask for help?

Someone keeps asking me for help with some of their computer issues. To help with that person with their issue, there will come a time that we need to log into on of their online accounts. This person either has their login info on a simple text file or on a piece of paper. I recommended that person to use a password manager like Bitwarden. The person keeps saying yes but after a while the person comes back to me with computer issues and the cycle repeats itself. I told the person that the notes are not organized because I ask the person “I see you have a Gmail email account here. Is that the password for the Gmail site (Google) itself or the password for the Apple account that you used the Gmail email for”. Keep in mind we still haven’t reached the original computer problem they have because we’re still trying to figure out how to log into their online account. There’s a saying “give a man a fish and you feed him for a day. Teach a man to fish and you feed him for a lifetime.” I don’t mind fixing their computer issues but the login issues with the persons account is always prevalent to begin with and takes up so much time.

Posted Jun 8, 2026, 4:35 PM UTC

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