I don’t have air conditioning in my car. Most of the year, it doesn’t bother me, though I have been known to complain that driving on a hot summer day is just miserable.
But it isn’t unbearable.
What’s unbearable is driving that same car, in the rain, with the windows up, in July.
The heat by itself is miserable. The lack of breeze makes it suffocating.
And as I made the uncomfortable drive home today, I started thinking about the fresh air we often need in our lives when life is stressful and turns on the heat.
Because the heat will come. Life will throw us moments of intense activity, stressful situations, problems to solve, pain, or even tragedy. And when that happens and we reach out to people, we ask for understanding.
But simple understanding isn’t really what we need when life gets tough.
When someone is too empathetic, they mirror our stress back at us. They feel our outrage, wallow in our despair, agree with our assessments. They totally take our side.
We may feel validated, but we don’t feel BETTER. In fact, we usually feel worse because the problem seems bigger. The temperature just goes up.
Still, we need SOME understanding.
When someone hears us with judgment but no empathy, they tell us the heat is our fault, or that the problem we face isn’t really that big a deal, or that we just need to “get over it.”
We feel alone and invalidated and like the heat will never end. The air just gets thicker and hard to breathe.
What we actually need, is some who listens with empathy AND judgment.
The right friend or advisor will listen to our feelings and empathize with our pain. But they will also point out new perspectives and give us additional facts to help us see more options. They will let us know when we have the power to make changes in our situation, and they will advise us accordingly.
Then we feel validated and valued. And we also feel like there is hope – that the heat will not last forever.
And that is a breath of fresh air.