The choice of a less empathic life
Empathy is probably the word I pronounced the most in 2018.
You gotta have empathy.
Empathy is my corest core value.
Life without empathy isn’t right.
I spent a lot of time thinking about what empathy is, trying to define it and challenge other people’s definition of it. I also spent a lot of time arguing why everyone should focus on developing their empathy more and more and more.
All of that is fine, until you push it to the extreme. Let’s call that condition hyper-empathy.
As I became hyper-empathic, I lost vision of an important piece of the equation.
I spent so much time putting myself in others’ shoes I forgot to be in my own.
I put all of my needs second. I didn’t express them, didn’t even consider them and hoped that others would naturally dig into my soul and surface them — in essence, be hyper-empathic towards me.
I would constantly ask myself:
“I’m caring so empathically for all these people. Who’s going to take care of me?”
Without ever clearly voicing what I needed, or asking for care.
The consequences
Extreme empathy got me to stay in a relationship I wasn’t happy in for a few extra months, because I was so concerned with my ex-partner’s feelings and well being.
Extreme empathy embarked me on someone else’s vision; a vision that I did not want to share. It got me to ask “How will I allow myself to quit?” for months, while being paralyzed of taking action.
It led me to assume responsibility for a lot more than necessary during fights with my friends, without voicing my own hurting. That created resentment and anxiety, and it came close to crushing one of my oldest friendships.
Overall, my emotional state was weird and unsettling.
I felt fulfilled from supporting others, but my own internal world was hurting, without being able to pin down what was wrong.
I couldn’t sit with uncomfortable emotions because I felt like the most important person who was supposed to be there for me, i.e. me, was too busy pouring all of her energy into others.
The irony was that behaving hyper-empathically did not create high quality relationships either.
Since I wasn’t overall comfortable with my own behavior, it only got me to unproductive fights where resentment and unexpressed needs were rotting my friendships and romantic relationship.
I realized I was afraid to define clear boundaries
I feared I would hurt others. I became terrible at saying No.
Going back in time
I did a lot of work on myself this year to understand all of the above. All of these learnings and new beliefs did not come to me overnight, but I’d like to share some of what happened inside me during that process.
As I addressed some of my past and forgotten trauma, I had this vision inside my head: I went back in time and hugged my past self. Literally.
I would close my eyes and project my present back in time: I saw myself reliving the difficult experiences I’ve been through, but instead of being the protagonist of the scene, there were two of me: the Laïla who was there, and me, holding myself.
My internal dialog switched from:
“Why am I feeling this way, I shouldn’t feel uneasy, or uncomfortable, or unhappy, or sad, suck it up”.
To:
“Hey, cut yourself some slack. You have been through a lot, you get to not be a wonder woman every day.
And you’ll be fine.
And I’m here.”
I realized that cultivating my relationship with myself doesn’t only include being introspective, but also to:
Be a support to myself,
learn to sit with my emotions,
and communicate my needs clearly without fear of overstepping others’ needs.
I finally learned how to create boundaries
I learned how to create clear lines of conducts for myself.
- I’m willing to be there for you, but only if I’ve put on my own oxygen mask on first.
- I’m willing to listen to you and recognize my wrong doings, but I will also stand my ground until I feel heard and ask for what I need.
- I will embrace my uneasy emotions, and consider them as friends who are helping me decide when to say “Yes”, and when to say “No”.
I accepted that boundaries will not make everyone around me happy, but that it’s also not my role to strive to do so.
Empathy is still part of my core values, and by no means am I saying one shouldn’t be empathic.
However, taking the time to be more empathic to myself and incorporate boundaries in my code of conduct has helped me feel better than I ever felt before.
Joyful, grateful, and also comfortable with feeling sad, uneasy, anything else that arises.
In essence, mentally powerful.
