Empathy Starts at Home!Written by Manya Arond-Thomas
"Create loving, accepting space around people and this will put irresistible pressure on them to grow to fill it" Mac Andrews"If you look to others for fulfillment, you will never truly be fulfilled. If your happiness depends on money, you will never be happy with yourself. Be content with what you have; rejoice in way things are. When you realize there is nothing lacking, whole world belongs to you." Lao Tzu In last issue, I talked about empathy as a core emotional competence for building relationships, influencing people, and getting buy-in based on ability to understand thoughts, feelings, and motives of another. However, why is it that empathy is now recognized to be so important for personal resilience and well-being? It's because our ability to be empathic with others starts with our ability to be empathic towards ourselves! Like so many other abilities and qualities that we've been taught (or admonished!) to practice with others –- charity, kindness, paying attention to others' needs first (also known as not being selfish), acceptance –- our ability to genuinely embody and demonstrate empathy depends on whether we can have it for ourselves. Another way to think about empathy is through lens of acceptance and non-judgment. Our ability to be empathic with another clearly reflects acceptance and lack of judgment about them. Yet if we don't accept certain aspects in ourselves, how can we truly be empathic with others when we witness those same qualities in them? Genuine and complete self-acceptance is a challenge for many people. Lack of empathy can show up as being hard on oneself (generally or specifically), or it can be a blind spot that is outside our awareness. C.G. Jung named those aspects of ourselves that we disown as "shadow self." Thus, while we may not recognize ourselves as having certain "undesirable" traits, those are often very things we non-empathically judge and reject in others. Where do people commonly lack empathy towards themselves? There seem to be certain key areas, that when challenged by someone else or triggered by some action we ourselves have taken, provoke self-judgment: - Things that challenge our competence (mistakes, areas where we don't feel competent that become apparent in day-to-day life such as conflict management, money, power and authority, emotional self-management, to name but a few) - Values -– both those to which we subscribe and those which we reject - Feelings that are uncomfortable or intolerable for us - Characteristics we deem as undesirable
| | 'Tis The SeasonWritten by Dr. Susan Rempel
‘Tis Season to be Jolly?By Dr. Susan Rempel I was listening to one of my favorite radio talk programs today. The topic of hour was “do you feel burdened by Christmas?” Much to my amazement host, and majority of his guests, spent better part of an hour whining and moaning about burdensome nature of holiday season. “I hate being with my relatives.” “Why do I have to spend all this money on presents for people I don’t like?” “There’s too much pressure!” “The traffic in stores is ridiculous.” It went on and on and on! It’s a well known fact that people tend to be more depressed during holiday season. It can be distressing if you live far away from your family. Some people actually become depressed because of decrease in their exposure to sunlight during winter months. However, what I heard today was different. People were just whining! They sounded like young children who were being forced to do their chores. Then, it hit me. Those people were suffering from PHLOP! What is PHLOP (pronounced “flop”)? Pre-Holiday Lack of Planning! It is my own term for describing what causes successful people turn into grinches during holiday season. Anyone who suffers from PHLOP will experience a range of symptoms that include: anxiety, sleeplessness, irritability, overeating (particularly of chocolate), anger, and irrationality. All of these symptoms cause them to miss out on true joy that should be experienced during holiday season. People who suffer from PHLOP get their first dose of anxiety when they begin to consider enormous list of things to do between Thanksgiving and end of year. There are cards to be sent, gifts to be bought and wrapped, parties to be planned, activities to be enjoyed, and thank you notes to be written. It’s enough to give a person indigestion! Then, add all of subtasks (e.g., everything that is involved in planning a party) to list. By then, that person has a major case of indigestion and beginning symptoms of a migraine. Of course, only reason that person experiences anxiety is because he or she is not organized. Do you suffer from PHLOP? It’s not too late to change things – even for this holiday season! Consider consequences of not planning out how you will get everything done before January 31. Your tasks will get done at last minute. They will not be done well. Worst of all, you may not finish them at all! Let’s face it, there is nothing worse than looking at a stack of holidays cards that were signed, sealed, and addressed, but just didn’t make it to post office. If you would like some help organizing your holiday schedule for this and future Christmas seasons, you should get a copy UnCommon Courtesy & Coaching’s PHLOP busting holiday organizer by visiting our Christmas Corner at: http://www.uncommoncourtesy.com/holidayplanner.htm . Let me also take a moment to suggest some things that will help you to enjoy this holiday season. First, consider making some of your gifts. People generally think about making gifts only when they are very young, super organized, or short on cash. You need not begin crocheting purses for your friends in August in order to make presents. Think about baking a few batches of bar cookies and then dividing them up onto colorful Christmas plates. Wrap them in cellophane and tie them with colorful ribbon. It’s easy, cheap, and all your friends will love it. After all, have you ever had anyone tell you that they did not like a plate full of cookies? How about buying a number of inexpensive items and putting them in a basket. The presentation will impress heck out of recipient. Whatever you decide to make, constructing gift yourself will make it more meaningful to both you and person who receives it.
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