5 Ways We Help One Another Get Through a Bad Day
- 1. Listen – It’s a basic human need to be seen and heard.
- 2. Listen – Give attention, be silent, suspend judgement
- 3. Listen – Listening comes from the heart and doesn’t need to defend, advise or react.
- 4. Listen – Listening to pain, we join one another. Our common experience grows into a deep empathy.
- 5. Listen – Be curious.
“Therefore, the truth is that we are either for or against life, change, and the passions of the spirit. We cannot pretend to be listening when we are not. We are products of how we live. Healing and transforming things can happen between people when there is the true presence of mutual openness to the wind. Listeners that have brought themselves to this mystery time and time again become deeply wise and powerful people. Awed by their participation, they become better and better listeners. Their souls are weathered souls which carry not only their own life wounds, but those of friends and lovers. Some rare listeners seem to feel the wounds of the world.”
Carl Faber
Carl Faber was my first mentor as a psychotherapist. He died of cancer at the age of 60.