When Someone You Love Is Suffering
Cuando alguien a quien amas está sufriendo
A question about how to be present with a loved one going through intense emotional pain, such as a divorce.
When Someone You Love Is Suffering
A question about how to be present with a loved one going through intense emotional pain, such as a divorce.
He just went through a divorce.
I see. So the question is really about how to be with someone who is suffering deeply. When someone close to you is going through something like that, the pull is very strong to try to fix it, to offer advice, to make the pain go away. But most of the time, what is actually needed is simply your presence.
You don't have to do anything special. You don't have to say the right thing. In fact, trying to say the right thing often gets in the way. What helps is that you are there, fully, without an agenda. Not trying to push the person toward some resolution or some lesson they should learn from it. Just being available.
The urge to fix
The hardest part is tolerating your own discomfort. When you see someone you care about in pain, it activates something in you. There is a feeling of helplessness, maybe even guilt, and the urge to fix is really about relieving your own discomfort as much as theirs. If you can recognize that, if you can sit with your own discomfort without acting on it, then you become a much more stable presence for the other person.
Listening without filling the space
Let there be silence. Let there be space. If he wants to talk, listen. If he doesn't want to talk, just be there. Don't fill the space with reassurances like "everything will be fine" or "it's for the best." Those phrases are for you, not for him. He knows, somewhere, that life will continue. But right now he is in the middle of it, and the middle of it is painful.
The most generous thing you can offer anyone who is suffering is your willingness to be with them in their suffering without needing it to change.