Feeling the support of having someone be fully present and attentive to our suffering or emotional turbulence is the most profoundly healing experience. Yet, it’s so easy to slip into ‘fixing’ mode, and if I ever do that to you, please call me out on it. Because, what I have learnt, is that I am most effective when, instead of offering advice (unless you have specifically asked for it and even then I would rather explore options with you rather than tell you what to do), no matter how well intentioned, or telling you how you ‘should’ feel, I give you my full attention and say “Hey, I am here, and I hear you.” I also know, that this is what most deeply helps me. To feel that spark of human connection that serves as reminder that none of us is in this alone. To remember that it’s okay to feel pain. We all suffer at some point or the other, and sometimes I need to suffer alone, but if I turn to you for support (which is never easy for me), what I need right then, is for you to just listen and be there. Don’t try to tell me it’s going to be okay-that’s false reassurance- neither of us know that, the future is yet undefined. Whatever else you do, please also don’t tell me that I shouldn’t be feeling this way. That makes me feel like my feelings are invalid, or that I am too much for you. If I’m crying don’t try to hug me or placate me, because right then those tears of release and emotion are exactly what I need. I will do the same for you, because I know that interrupting right then would be an expression of any discomfort I may be experiencing myself, and will make it about me, rather than you. I don’t need you to take away my pain (perhaps it is what carries my most powerful lessons, and without it I will not gain the strength that I will need in this life), nor am I on this earth to take away yours. But in that moment when you are at your lowest and you have sought me out, what I can do, is to honour and hold space for the beautiful raw authenticity and vulnerability that you are allowing me to witness. I can offer you an open heart and compassion, and without judgment be there for you. To ride out the storm with you, and hold your hand, whether metaphorically or physically. I can also ask you, “What can I do right now, to support you better?” I am profoundly grateful to all those that have given this to me, and those that I have been able to provide this for. These encounters have transformed me, and connected me deeper into my own innate humanity. If you choose to come to me for support, as a healer, as a therapist, or just as a friend, or another human being, a strange acquaintance, I promise to do my best to do this for you, and as I said before- if I don’t, remind me, and in that moment we can experience what it means to be human together.
Posted on: Tue, 06 Jan 2015 05:13:32 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015