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It’s so important that parents have open lines of communication with their teenagers. When teens feel like they can talk to their parents, they can work through a lot of problems and avoid even more. But it’s not always easy to have good communication with teenagers. Learning To Communicate With Your Teenager Being a surly teenager is par for the course, and it’s tough on everyone. Teens are going through a developmental stage in which they need to assert their autonomy and identity so their behavior can be pretty off-putting to their parents and other adults. What parents need to understand is that just because their teen might be pushing them away with obnoxious behavior and eye-rolling, it doesn’t mean that the young person has no need for parental support. In fact, because this is such a loaded time, teenagers need more support and guidance than ever. They’re exploring their identity, sexuality, and aspirations. They need someone wiser and more experienced to talk to, but they’ll run the other way if they’re feeling judged or coerced. They want an accepting listener who’ll support them in their goals and guide them in their life choices; not judge, jury, and executioner. Teens need to feel connected to their parents if they’re going to open up to them, but it’s harder these days for teens to connect. Social media makes it easier to be isolated and disconnected from parents and peers, as teens can opt to plug into their technology and stay plugged in, rather than build real-life relationships. It’s up to the parents to foster these invaluable connections. They can do this by involving teens in regular parent-child or family activities. It can be family dinners; attending religious services together; weekly bike-riding, hikes in the woods or basketball games; doing…
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By passport and birth, I am Romanian. By soul, I am a citizen of the world. I’ve always been fascinated by cultures, traditions, mentalities, and different ways of doing things and perceiving the world. So when I got my first working contract in Sweden twelve years ago, I embraced it with tremendous joy.
Five years later I took one of the biggest steps in my life and moved to Shanghai. I was an Eastern-European woman leading a Chinese team, in an entirely new environment, so different from anything I had experienced before. After Shanghai, life brought me to South Korea and Mexico for other four exciting years. Today, I am sharing these insights from my current home in Dubai.
Looking back on my life, I know I used to expect others to behave in specific predefined ways, and I stereotyped people based on their country of origin. For example, I assumed that all Italians would speak a lot and loudly. All Swedish would be blond and shy. All Greeks would be cheese lovers, and all Chinese were supposed to eat dog meat.
Cognitive distortions like labeling or stereotyping separate us and shut us down. When I was meeting the world with a “my way or no way” approach, I was stuck on my ego. My mind was too busy judging, so it had no time to listen or understand other points of view, and everything outside my comfort zone scared me.
The real shift happened the day I decided to meet new people with the eyes of a child, with curiosity and a genuine interest to know them and connect with them, from the heart. I started to ask questions, like: “What makes you say this?” “What makes you do that?” or “I’m not sure I understand. Can you tell me more about that?”
New insights and new perspectives came to life that I’d like to share with you today:
They say beauty is in the eye of the beholder, and I believe this is true. Knowing this helped me stop judging the Chinese, South Korean, or Japanese for hiding themselves under big umbrellas during summer.
As an Eastern-European woman, I was raised to believe “summer beauty” was all about getting a nice, sexy chocolate-like complexion. However, during my stay in Asia, I was always complimented on my “gorgeous white skin” because here beautiful often means “white.” So if you visit this part of the world, don’t get surprised to see lots of whitening products in beauty shops.
Each time you think you’re not beautiful enough, your nose is too long, or your hips are too big, remember that beauty is a norm, shaped by societies and cultures. Spend your precious time by finding your own kind of beauty. You are what you believe. Decide you are gorgeous and see what happens.
If you are concerned with what other people think about you, know this and set yourself free: if they find you intelligent, stupid, ugly, or average, that has nothing to do with you. It’s all about them and what they see in you after they evaluate you through their standards and expectations.
Take my example: a Swedish colleague once told me I was “scary”—“too emotional, too talkative, and too intense.” I wanted to know more about myself, so I asked colleagues from Romania what they thought about that feedback. They found it funny: “What? You, scary? You, intense? Who told you that? You must be kidding!”
To them, I was normal. Showing vulnerability and expressing emotions at work was not common in Sweden, but it was normal to me.
That’s where the differences came from. It wasn’t right or wrong; it was just different. Every time people tell you that you are “too little of this” or “too much of that,” know that it has nothing to do with you. It’s about how they’re reacting to you, so don’t take it personally.
Every culture holds a set of primary values that influence the way we act and think. In Sweden, for example, I learned the word “lagom” (meaning “not too much”), which is an expression of humbleness.
In other words, one should not stick out and be too much out of anything, or believe they are “some kind of special.” On the opposite side, if you were raised in a country that puts a high focus on acknowledging and praising your individuality, acting and thinking “lagom” about yourself might be hard.
Countries such as China or South Korea value harmony: let us all agree and collaborate, so it’s a win-win for everybody, and no one has to lose. Kind of “me happy, you happy.” So don’t get surprised if people tell you they agree with you when, in fact, they don’t. It’s all about avoiding conflict and “keeping face,” for the sake of the collective harmony.
Knowing the cultural values in a given country is another way to understand why people behave differently. We all have our own historical, social background, but diversity doesn’t have to be scary. Imagine how boring life would be if everyone thought the same: no learning from each other, no brainstorming of new ideas, no evolution and growth.
It is essential that we embrace our differences with compassion and accept diversity as a reality of the world we all live in. Souls don’t hold a passport. In spirit, there’s no separation, no nationality or religion. Those have been assigned to each of us at birth.
Sara Fabian is a Women’s Empowerment & Career Coach and inspirational speaker, on a mission to help professional women to discover their unique strengths, gifts and talents, boost their confidence, find their calling and live a meaningful life of purpose. For weekly inspiration, subscribe to her free newsletter at www.sarafabiancoaching.com or follow her on Facebook.
Image courtesy of Shutterstock.
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We’re told from a very young age that if we can help someone in pain or in need, we should do it. When we see a friend struggling with an emotional problem, we want them to talk to us, we want to listen and help them feel better. This is a natural part of life and something we should be proud of. The problem is, what if you become everyone’s confidant, what if you’re so good at listening and giving advice that everyone comes to you? Well, welcome to the world of empathy fatigue.
Before we go too deep, do you think that’s a good situation or a bad one?
You can look at it from both sides. Firstly, it’s great people trust you and feel you can help. That should make you feel good. Secondly however, there is only so much empathy you can show and give, before you start to feel like your own needs aren’t being met, and that you’re basically an emotional doormat for everyone who has a problem.
It’s such a fine line. [Read: Why being an empath in a relationship is a blessing and a curse]
What exactly is empathy?
Empathy is the ability to listen and understand someone’s emotions and feelings, and in many ways, to be able to give advice to help them. Even if you don’t give advice, you say words which are comforting. A person with a high empathy level is someone who can make others feel better.
There is a slight difference between being an empath, and being a person with empathy however.
An empath is someone who can pick up on the feelings of another person and takes those feelings on as their own. For example, if someone is feeling sad, an empath may spend a short amount of time around that person and then suddenly start to feel sad themselves, when they have no real reason to. [Read: 12 strong signs of an empath – Do you feel deeper than others?]
On the other hand, a person with empathy has the ability to listen and understand emotions, but they don’t actually feel them as their own. They are able to put themselves in the person’s shoes mentally, but not spiritually. They may feel sympathy for the person and really be able to understand the deeper reasons and emotions below the surface, but unlike an empath, there is no transfer of emotions going on.
So, you’re not necessarily an empath if you have empathy?
Not necessarily, no. A good example of someone who has empathy is a professional counselor. That person is able to listen to and understand the feelings of another person, and able to help them via the advice they give. This is more than mere listening, it is really having a greater understanding of how they feel and why.
An empath on the other hand is very likely to feel extremely overwhelmed being around people for a long period of time. The constant back and forth of different emotions whilst simply waiting for the bus can cause that person to need to lay down in a darkened room and center themselves.
What is empathy fatigue?
Those explanations bring us onto the main point of this feature – empathy fatigue.
An empath feels empathy fatigue practically on a constant basis, but it is a slightly different type of deal. For a person with empathy, they can easily suffer from empathy fatigue if they try to take on too much. It is possible to shield yourself from the fatigue, but it can be difficult to say ‘no’ to someone when they ask to sit and talk to you.
This is why people who have actually developed empathy fatigue never really find they feel better – they fail to put themselves first. [Read: Do you feel emotionally drained? 15 reasons and cures that work]
Empathy fatigue and how all of us experience it
Let’s give an example to make this clearer.
A close friend has just split up with their partner. They’re devastated because they were cheated on, they’d been together for years, and they shared a home. Now your friend is left single and alone, they’re trying to process everything and really struggling with it. They turn to you for help and advice and you gladly listen to them for the first few times. After a while, you start to feel a little down yourself, you’re constantly going over and over the same thing all the time and your friend is calling you on a regular basis to talk things over.
At first, you feel bad for the way you feel. You want to be there for your friend, but you have little time to relax and spend time with your own partner, and you know if you try and explain that to your friend, they may become upset or misunderstand.
In addition, the things your friend is telling you is starting to make you relive some upsetting events in your past, things which you thought you had dealt with and put to bed. All in all, you feel exhausted, but you’re not sure how to handle the situation.
Ladies and gentlemen, this is classic empathy fatigue.
When a person is going through a hard time and they find someone they can talk to, they tend to stick to that person like glue. They’ve finally found someone who understands them and they see a glimmer of light at the end of the tunnel. For the person doing the listening, they feel good that they’re helping someone, but then it suddenly starts to become so regular that they begin feeling guilty about the growing resentment that is bubbling below the surface. [Read: 12 quick ways to stop negative people from sapping your energy]
What you first need to realize is that what you’re feeling is 100% normal. How can you not become tired and exhausted of hearing the same thing all the time? How can you not become a little fed up of saying the same thing over and over again? Yes, you feel guilty for thinking it, but you feel guilty because you’re a good person. Do not beat yourself up.
What should you do?
This is going to sound brutal, but if you want to successfully get over your empathy fatigue and feel better in yourself, you need to take time for number one, i.e. you.
Turn off your phone, just for a day. The world is not going to stop turning and nothing is going to blow up. In those 24 hours, do things that you enjoy, and do them alone or with people who bring you joy and lift you up. Do not spend that day with the person who you have been helping. You need to recharge your own batteries and rest your soul for a short while. [Read: Too empathetic? How to detach yourself and find a better life]
Practice a little self-love. Have a hot bath, read a book, go for a walk, go to the gym if you like it, eat your favorite foods, call a friend you always have a laugh with, basically do the things which your soul is crying out for and see how good it makes you feel.
Of course, when you turn your phone back on, you’re probably going to have missed calls. That’s fine. You deserve a life too. You were not put on this planet to be at someone’s beck and call for advice. You are not an agony aunt!
Sounds harsh? Possibly so, but fair. [Read: How to help someone up when they’re down and depressed]
Help yourself first if you want to help others
In order to help other people, you need to also help yourself. Of course, your friend is not in the wrong for leaning on you in times of need, and having 24 hours to yourself doesn’t mean you’re not going to listen to her again; you probably will the very next day.
What those 24 hours do however is give you a break, and allow you to get back to you. That is something we all need from time to time, and when you’re suffering from empathy fatigue, it is a vital part of the recharging process.
Empathy fatigue can be explained in a very easy way – when you’re tired from a long day at work, you lay down on the sofa and relax. Do you feel guilty about that? No. So why are you feeling guilt for looking after yourself when you’re suffering from empathy fatigue and your emotions are tired? Don’t feel guilty for occasionally looking after number one.
[Read: The art of not giving a shit – 15 lessons to cure your fatigue]
You may have your best intentions at heart when you help someone emotionally. But when you feel empathy fatigue setting in, disconnect and find your happy place. You can’t help someone who’s in a well when you slip into it yourself.
The post Empathy Fatigue: The Guilt-Free Guide to Recognize & Overcome It is the original content of LovePanky – Your Guide to Better Love and Relationships.
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https://themindsjournal.com/the-signs-as-their-superpower/
The Signs As Their Superpower
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