SPECIAL HEAD’S-UP
I want to alert you to a podcast which just dropped. The Just-in Words podcast entitled–Just Emotional Healing with Ed is 47 minutes long and is one of the most far reaching, informative episodes I have ever done.
Justin and I cover a wide range of issues from my origin story through the emotions cycle, emotions in the context of drugs and alcohol, emotion display rules, having adaptive arguments, dealing with grudges, mind-reading, sincere apologies and recovering from trauma.
I highly recommend that you click on the episode and invest the 47 minutes.
In my last post, I offered 4 rules to guide you in dealing with another person who is directing their emotions at you.
In the next two posts, I will approach the subject of dealing with another person from a different perspective. I will address the issue of empathy.
At some point in time, you have probably been advised that you should learn to emphasize with someone else in order to facilitate your understanding that individual?
Typically, this is expressed as…
Put yourself or walk a mile in their shoes.
This is certainly good (and correct) advice.
However, I’ll bet that you were never sure what it meant to “empathize” with another.
So, this is where I will start.
The Merriam-Webster online dictionary defines Empathy as: “the feeling that you understand and share (emphasis added) another person’s experiences and emotions.”
I call this true empathy as opposed to effective empathy.
That said, when it comes to another person’s feelings, there are at least two reasons why true empathy is impossible and both focus on the share aspect of the definition of empathy.
First of all, we cannot actually share another’s experience and emotions.
Each individual’s interactions with the world are often complex, multifaceted and interpreted through that person’s unique set of filters which we do not share. Plus, we may have our own set of filters through which we view the world and of which we may or may not be aware.
Secondly, the nature of language is such that even a very good communicator, which most of us are not, often lacks the words to completely describe their experiences.
The good news, however, is that, while true empathy is not possible, effective empathy (my words) is very possible.
Effective empathy focuses on the understand part of the definition of empathy.
Working therapeutically with the young women in the California Department of Corrections-Juvenile Division was challenging for me because there were many barriers between me and the young women which had to be overcome before I could establish some empathy and effectively offer them therapy.
Here is a partial list of these potential barriers to empathy:
- History + Gender: Most of these women had histories of multiple abuse by men. I was a white, middle-class, male and I did not have a history of either abuse or incarceration.
- Race: Many of my female clients were women of color.
- Language: Not only was there an educational gap between us but these young women had very little experience dealing with feelings or using emotional words. in other words, asking “How do you feel?” often elicited single word, not very informative, answers.
Establishing effective empathy, as I see it, involves being able to understand another person’s world from their point of view.
Note that I said their point of view. Not mine.
I was tasked with treating these young women as I will discuss in more detail below.
But, the same principles apply to you if you are trying to communicate with a spouse, a co-worker, your teenager, or any person with whom you have significant issues which it is important to both of you to resolve.
This involves three major steps.
First, you have to establish that you genuinely care enough to want to understand how they view their world. If you are only using key phrases and are not sincerely interested in connecting with the other person, your words will be perceived as hollow, you will not connect, and effective empathy will elude you.
Secondly, you need to know what emotions are and the messages each emotion conveys. This information will aid you in gaining the understanding and empathy you seek and is what emotional mastery is all about.
Thirdly, you need to take the time and make the effort to both let them and, if necessary, help them tell you how they see their world. This is where you use your empathic language as well as other communication skills and emotional words to help the other person paint a verbal picture of their world and their concerns.
With my young female clients, my first step was to establish that I could not know how these young women experienced their world because I was clearly not one of them.
My approach to these young women from the start of therapy was to state, upfront, that I could not totally understand or be able to relate to the experiences they had which led to their being incarcerated (and in my office). This, by the way, eliminated any attempt on their part to marginalize me by pointing out that I couldn’t work with them because I was (white, male, a staff member, etc.) .
Maybe, you have been accused of not being able to understand because you are… a male, an adult, a boss, or perhaps, an idiot (just kidding!).
With my clients, I then pointed out to them that I was very interested in helping them but that in order for me to do this..
I needed them to help me understand them and the experiences they went through (emphasis added).
I was successful with these young women because I was able to establish that we shared a common interest or, at least, a common ground. My clients wanted to get out and stay out of “jail” and I wanted to help them do this.
They needed my help and I needed them to help me be able to work with them.
For you, when you are trying to relate to another person who is different from you in some way, to say that you understand them before you have any basis for this statement, may be very off-putting and build up additional barriers between you and the other person. Think here about a man talking to a woman, a parent talking to a child, or a superior talking to a subordinate.
When you engage with another person, you can acknowledge your differences and your common goals and establish that you want to understand their point of view.
I will cover steps 2 and 3 in the next post.