Asking for help with a lease doesn’t make you less independent. Signing blind would.

Independence gets confused with doing everything without help, which is a definition that will cost you money. The grown version is not getting stuck inside an agreement you did not understand. A lease is a year of your life written in language built to be skimmed, and whoever reads it carefully is the one actually in charge of it.

Before signing anything, have someone who has done it before read it with you, and bring two questions: what happens if I need to leave early, and what am I on the hook for besides rent. Asking takes an afternoon. A missed clause takes twelve months.