Connection makes it better

I keep thinking about that super popular video of Brené Brown talking about empathy and why I show it so often when I teach de-escalation training for Rutgers. The wisdom she shares about how to support someone with empathy is so obvious that we tend to overlook it. Usually when a bad thing happens, you want to get rid of it - move as quickly as possible through it. Or you want to avoid it, so you either fix it or you try to "make it better" with words. But words don't make it better. Words can't make it better. Connection makes it better - that is the message of the video.

Although, it can be tough to connect when you're anxious and uncomfortable. Connection sometimes requires us to learn to tolerate discomfort and just sit with it. And that's usually the hardest part for people. I think about how I was in so much emotional pain I wanted to jump out of my body the days and weeks after I lost my father. That pain was so unbearable to me I had no idea how humans could survive it - though I knew they did, and that I would as well. Nobody wants to ever feel that bad. You wonder why human psychology has evolved to ever feel that bad. And what helped me the most on the day to day were the texts and calls, even the ones I didn't answer, that reminded me that I wasn't alone. Every single message, card, reply on a social media post kept me going.

If simple acts of connection can get you through some unbearable moments in life, what can it do for learning?