Difficult conversations are an inevitable part of life, whether it’s resolving a conflict with a loved one or consoling a friend in distress. These conversations are emotionally charged which makes them tricky to navigate in the heat of the moment.
A key skill that helps us during these times is empathy and it’s becoming quite the buzzword. Empathy allows us to connect on a deeper level, understand perspective, and respond to needs in a more compassionate and rational way. Speaking to emotions makes people feel accepted and heard, whereas when they are not acknowledged, it can make them feel resentful, rejected or unimportant.
Read on for a step-by-step approach on how to remain empathetic, during difficult conversations.
Avoid mind reading
Has your partner ever responded to you with “Don’t tell me how I feel!”? If so, this is completely plausible because you’ll never be able to fully understand another person’s lived experience. The best you can do is be curious about gathering enough information to help you imagine what it’s like to be in their shoes.
The minute you start jumping to conclusions is the minute you start mind reading, and we are all so bad at this. Even the likes of Derren Brown (famous mentalist and illusionist), would admit they can’t actually mind reading but are experts at creating enough illusions to make it seem to be the case. Other reasons we are bad at mind reading are because people’s challenging situations can trigger an emotional response that clouds our judgment, not to mention 24 cognitive biases at play.
Allow time to vent
During times of distress, being able to express feelings is cathartic. As opposed to letting someone bottle up their feelings, we should provide people with the chance to release any emotional tension they may be experiencing. Engaging with your emotions is the first step to accepting them. Without acceptance, they become buried with the potential to resurface in an unhealthy way.
It’s important to provide a space for people to express their feelings and this means letting them speak without interruption. Doing this not only makes people feel heard and valued but also enables them to gain a sense of clarity. Being able to communicate helps one reorganise thoughts, known as the cognitive theory. Such thoughts could have been circulating for some time and become further distorted with each circulation.
Finally, allow time for mini pauses. We’re so used to jumping from one conversation to another that mini periods of silence appear somewhat unusual. In response to this, people feel the need to fill natural pauses with speech, and this can become a habit if not careful. While you might be removing some discomfort by filling these pauses with noise, you might be stopping someone from having that crucial realisation. Sometimes that sense of clarity is just around the corner.
Practice mindfulness
Mindfulness is another powerful tool for remaining empathetic during difficult conversations. By being present and fully engaged in the conversation, we are better able to tune into our own emotions and those of the other person. This can help us remain calm and centered, even in the face of challenging emotions or conflicting viewpoints.
One way of doing this is to practice deep breathing using the 4-5-6 pattern. First, inhale for 4 seconds, then hold your breath for 5 seconds, finishing with an inhale of 6 seconds. This pattern is only a guide so if you’re not used to deep breathing, practice it beforehand (you wouldn’t want to let out a big exhale while they are speaking).
When people are venting, it can be tempting to either engage or stop them. Thinking of how to respond is also an immediate sign of you losing presence and mindfulness. Even if you do think you’ve understood the situation, let them finish and be careful not to slip into mind-reading mode. Stay curious.
Listen actively
While everyone likes a good listener, what they mean is an active listener as opposed to a passive one. Active listening is also a vital skill to practice during difficult conversations. This involves focusing on what the other person is saying, asking questions for clarification, and reflecting back on what you have heard to ensure understanding. When we listen actively, we demonstrate that we value the other person’s perspective and are willing to hear them out, even if we don’t necessarily agree with their point of view. While it’s good to acknowledge speech with the occasional ‘hmmm’, careful not to overdo it, as it can come across as ingenuine or make people feel pressured to finish.
Hold on a minute Sherlock! (Avoid giving solutions)
Sometimes the right thing to say is nothing at all. I have this thought when someone close to me announces the tragic news of someone passing. (If I put myself in their shoes, there’s nothing that I want to hear or that can be said to make me feel better). There is no solution to this problem other than to bring the person back.
When you hear that someone is in a difficult situation, your immediate instinct may be to help them and what that does is push us into solution mode. While we may feel better because we think we’re being helpful, your partner or friend isn’t always in need of your opinions or solutions.
In order to have a greater influence over others, you need to speak to people’s emotions and understand what makes them tick, in other words, use your emotional and social intelligence. People possess all the solutions they need, it’s just a case of helping them access them. Once people come up with their own solutions, they will feel much more empowered.
Read more about James McIntyre-Ure and his other articles HERE
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