storybookprincess:

libertarirynn:

“Am I showing empathy to this hurting person by mentioning a similar personal experience or just making it all about me?“, a memoir

here’s my take on this (and it’s probably not what you want to hear):

most of the time, whether it’s your intention or not, yeah, it does come across as you making it about you.  (there’s an exception but i’ll get to that later)

showing empathy would go something like “wow, that sounds really difficult.”  “i can tell you’re in a bad place right now.”  “i’m sorry.  you probably feel really overwhelmed by this.”  “it isn’t right that you have to go through this.”  those are all effective ways of comforting someone.  but talking about yourself?  no.  not so much.

if we’re on the empathy train anyway, put yourself in their shoes.  if you went to someone & said, “oh my god, my girlfriend dumped me & i’m so upset.” you probably wouldn’t want to hear “oh, well my girlfriend dumped me last year and & it was so painful.  i couldn’t eat for a week.  blah blah going on about your pain.”

what you would want to hear is “i know breakups can be really tough & i’m sorry that happened.  want to talk about it?”  that’s showing empathy.  but let me assure you, very few people want to hear about your pain when they’re in a moment of pain (coming to the exception to that soon).  what people want is love, support, understanding, and VALIDATION that what they’re going through is hard & what the feel is okay.  they do not want to hear about your pain.  it’s not an effective way to comfort someone.  it just isn’t.

here’s the exception: if someone says, for example, “sometimes i have this impulse to crash the car when i’m driving.  i feel so alone.  i must be a bad person for feeling that way.  no one else feels that way but me & that makes me bad.” then it’s okay to say “no, i feel that way too sometimes.  in fact, everyone gets intrusive thoughts about crashing their cars.  everyone.  you’re not bad for feeling that bc we all feel that.”  so if the root of the pain is that they feel totally isolated by their situation & you know for an absolute fact you’ve experienced something similar, then it’s okay.  but notice how the focus stays on that person’s experience & feelings, not you.

tl;dr: stop turning the conversation towards you when someone is in a moment of pain, bc, whether it’s your intention or not, yeah, it comes across as making it all about you.  practice validating feelings (i can tell you’re really struggling/that sounds really hard/wow, that situation sounds so frustrating to deal with) and showing support (i’m always here for you/i love you no matter what/i’m with you in this pain).  that’s really all you need to comfort someone well.  listen to them.  but pls stop talking about your own pain.  i’m sorry, but it’s really ineffective.

go forth & comfort your friends better!