Presence with Pain - The Art of Empathy

When people we are close to are going through challenges in their lives, our natural inclination is to want to support them, to help them through their pain and return to a place of peace and happiness.  Before I understood empathy as I understand it now, my response to those I wanted to support was usually to suggest things I thought would make them feel better, or I might have suggested ways they could look at their issue differently and learn from their situation, or I might have shared a similar challenge I had had and how I had felt and what I had done about it.  Most times these efforts to support others left them unsatisfied.  They may not have expressed this verbally, but it would be clear by their energy and body language.  I would be left feeling unsatisfied as well, and puzzled.  My attempts to support were coming from genuine caring, and yet I was not getting the sense that I was being of much help at all.  Most puzzling and frustrating were the times it seemed that those I wanted to support were feeling worse after my genuine attempts to help.

Now I see that I was missing what I experience as the fundamental piece of support for myself or someone else who is in pain.  Empathic presence.  I was trying to do something for others, trying to fix them instead of just Being with them.  Offering strategies and solutions, stories and ideas, is an indirect way of telling someone, “This is how you could be different then you are right now.”  We want to help and we think that if we explain to someone how they can solve their situation, they will be happier – different than they are in that moment.

When we have strong emotions alive in us we are not able to easily use the part of our brain that analyzes and problem solves because we are using a different part of the brain that deals with emotions.  Empathy gives space for someone to be with their emotions, to have acceptance in themselves for their current state, and from this acceptance of what is alive in them, emotions release and pass.  Then the body relaxes, the brain returns to balance, and we can look at what we might want to do about our situation.  We are in a state to receive and contemplate suggestions or, even better, access our own knowing.

So if someone comes to you wanting support with their challenging situation, I invite you to set an intention to just be present with what is alive in them.  Suggest to yourself that there is nothing you need to solve.  As you hear about the challenge this person is going through, put your attention on their feelings and needs.  Notice what comes alive in you - your impulses to solve, educate, or share your stories, and come back to Being with the experience of the other.  With a compassionate focus, follow the unfolding of their feelings and needs.  When someone experiences space and presence for their initial feelings and needs, they tend to open up to deeper feelings and needs because the compassionate presence allows them to trust that there is space to continue opening.   And what do we say when we are Being with another in their pain?  Often, very little.  Our presence is such a gift that few words are needed.  When there is an intuitive sense that verbal reflection would support the empathic connection, we simply express what we sense the other is feeling and needing, which may sound like, “It sounds like you are feeling some despair because you have a deep need for the well being of the earth.”  Then we listen to the response and follow where their energy of feelings and needs goes from there.  Perhaps it opens to more depth of feelings and needs, or maybe there is a relaxing because together you have come to Being with the essence of what is alive in them.  I invite you to sit with them and let that relaxed state integrate.  They will ask you for suggestions and insights if they want them; and perhaps you could invite them to first ask themselves.