Happy Mondays

Leading life and happiness coach

IT IS one thing – and a good thing – to have enough empathy to feel someone else’s pain on a metaphorical level. If you nod and smile in the right places, make the universal “that sucks” face at the right intervals and have a ready supply of tissues for their issues you will be a good pal and the go-to gal/guy that everyone has on speed dial.

However it is quite another thing – and not a good thing – to feel someone else’s pain so strongly and with such immediate identification that you’re the one with the high blood pressure, crow’s feet and night sweats.

If you are the dumper you may feel purged, lighter, better for having a pal who really “gets” how you feel but if you are the dumpee and really “feel” as awful as your mate just did, you will feel like a sponge saturated in tears and despair, so full of their stuff that there is no room for your own.

Empathy overload is the poor unrecognised sister of compassion fatigue and although you may always be there for a friend in need the fallout for you can feel rotten.

For those with self-esteem deficit regularly to be the dumping ground for despair can have its pay-offs: it can mean that you get your own needs met by being wanted or relied upon in a crisis. Being a rescuer or a pity pillow is a noble pursuit but can mean that your self worth is predicated on how much you are needed to help others when you need to raise yourself up to something a bit more valuable than a shock absorber. Empathy overload can suck you dry, leaving you with little time to address your own problems. As horrible as it sounds, it can be addictive. How much easier to solve someone else’s stuff with a steady hand and sound advice than to look at your own agenda? How is being the Mistress of Misery or the Arch Duke of Agony really serving you?

Do you know the difference between helpful empathy with boundaries and addictive agony auntiedom, forever casting your eye on every problem except your own? Here’s how to be a smarter listener:

Give from the flow. This means listening and handling but not absorbing. Imagine a flow of white light strength zooming down your back bone. Give from that – not from every particle of your DNA so that you are not left a husk.

Feeling the pain and worrying aren’t the same as helping. Offer practical help and let the other person own the rest. Be there as a shoulder but not as the whole NHS or victim support.

Saying, “I’ve been so worried and upset about your problem” may show you care but it isn’t practical and helps and serves no one, least of all you.

You don’t have to feel other people’s pain to be helpful. Being there and a daily text or phone call can be enough.

Realise that other people’s happiness and wellbeing are 100 per cent their own responsibility. Be there when needed but know when to draw the line and retreat.