6 Steps Toward Empathetic Understanding

If you’re anything like me, I have a need to verbally process my thoughts and feelings. Keeping my thoughts and feelings inside of my brain just means I’m avoiding the reality that they are all jumbled up into this messy plate of spaghetti where no organization or resolution can happen. I’m spinning my wheels, but not going anywhere.

This is where empathetic understanding comes into play. At its core, empathetic understanding is a way for an active listener (receiver) to have a more complete and accurate picture of a person’s mind (the sharer) and how they feel by showing genuine understanding and validation of the sharer’s perspective.

Let’s give an example of this playing out in a real life scenario.

***This story is a real story taken from Reddit‘s Am I the A**hole subreddit***

“I’m pregnant with twins and my fiancé and I just found out we’re having a boy and a girl. We started talking about names the other day. We already knew we wanted these babies to have family names, we talked about it and mutually agreed. He told me that he really wanted to name the boy baby after himself (first and middle). I wasn’t onboard at first but after thinking about it, I agreed.

I told him that for the girl baby I wanted her first name to be my sister’s since we’re very close and the middle to be my dads since he passed when I was young. (My dads name isn’t really unisex but it’s becoming a common girl’s name). My fiancé got visibly sad and told me he wanted to name the girl baby after his mom and have the middle name be his dads name (his dads name IS a unisex name).

I told him that I didn’t really think it was fair that he got to name the first baby what he wanted and now wants to name the second baby also what he wants. I also said it wasn’t fair that my family gets excluded. He said he really wanted to incorporate at least his moms name.

I told him that the girl baby’s middle name can be his mom’s but then the boy’s middle name is going to be my dads. He said he wanted the boy baby named completely after him though so the baby is a Junior. I told him he doesn’t get to name both of the babies what he wants. He got upset about this comment and has been stand offish toward me. I don’t think that was so awful of me to say but now I’m second guessing my comment and wondering if I’m an a**hole for it.”

Now— though this author is writing her story, this story could just have easily been one long monologue that happened over the phone so for our purposes, let’s pretend it did.

So— how do we practice Empathetic Understanding using this scenario?

Step 1: Communicate your desire to show you understand their situation.

Even though her last statement in her monologue is her questioning whether or not she was an a**hole, our knee-jerk reaction is to give our opinion whether she was or wasn’t. But right now our opinion is irrelevant because we haven’t proved to her that we truly understand her situation. So, we have to back up and use phrases like:

“I want to make sure I understand.”

What this little phrase does is communicate that you care about her and how she’s feeling. It also validates that you listened to her well and now you’re going to prove that you understand her situation fully by doing step 2.

Step 2: Summarize the situation without judgment or opinion

This is a hard one for most people because it’s still delaying giving our opinion and not passing judgment. But don’t rush this. A summary of her story, starting with the emotion she’s feeling, followed by the unmet need is proving to her that you gave your undivided attention and listened well, but also that you truly understand the situation fully by summarizing the situation back to her. So, this situation could be summed up like this:

“You feel frustrated because you have a need for equal-respect. You want your children to share names from both you and your husband’s families equally. Your husband wants 3 out of the 4 possible names to reflect him and his family, leaving only one possible name for you and your family.”

Step 3: Ensure that your summary and understanding was correctly interpreted.

The way we prevent ourselves from being “know-it-alls” in these situations is by reaffirming that we don’t, in fact, “know it all”. We show this by giving the sharer the opportunity to correct us in our summary and understanding of the situation. We do this by asking questions like:

“Is that right?”

So if you are off at all, you’ve shown a willingness to be corrected, and they may feel the need to offer some other information to provide a more complete picture of the situation.

In it’s entirety, with the three steps used together, the response could look like this:

“I want to make sure I understand: you’re frustrated because you have a need for equal-respect. You want your children to share names from both you and your husband’s families equally. Your husband wants 3 out of the 4 possible names to reflect him and his family, leaving only one possible name for you and your family. Is that right?”

Let’s just say, for this example, she didn’t need to correct me in my interpretation of the scenario, or add any other information.

Step 4: Validate her feelings

Regardless of whether you agree with her or not, this is still not the time to offer your opinion. This is the step where you express empathetic language to validate that her feelings are real and that she is experiencing them. A phrase that could be used here is:

“I completely understand why you feel frustrated.”

Step 5: offer her choices that you’re willing to do to determine what she wants from you

There is a reason she is sharing this situation with you. Maybe it’s because she trusts you, or maybe you give great advice. Or maybe she just needs to vent. But we don’t know what she actually *wants* unless we ask her. So we give her choices:

“Would you like me to share my opinion, talk about solutions, or do you need to talk more about how you feel about it?”

Her answer will determine your action, and that is what step 6 is for.

Step 6: Follow through on what she requests from you

If she wanted a solution, give it. If she wanted to continue to vent, remind her of any obligations you may have that may cut the conversation short, but otherwise you’re all ears. If she wants to hear your opinion about how you’d feel if you were in her situation, share that. She may even want all 3 of these things, you’re just asking her which of them she wants first.

JUST TO RECAP: This is what the 6 steps in their entirety look and sound like when implemented (for this example)

STEPS 1-3: “I want to make sure I understand: you’re frustrated because you have a need for equal-respect. You want your children to share names from both you and your husband’s families equally. Your husband wants 3 out of the 4 possible names to reflect him and his family, leaving only one possible name for you and your family. Is that right?”

“Yes! Exactly!”

STEPS 4-5: “I completely understand why you feel frustrated. Would you like me to share my opinion, talk about solutions, or talk more about how you feel about it?”

“Am I the a**hole for wanting our two kids to share my family’s names and his family’s names equally?! I mean, he wanted to pick all 4 names at first, I get to carry these two humans inside of me, birth them, and he thinks he gets to choose all 4 names?!

By this being her response you know that she is wanting you to share your OPINION & ALLOW HER TO VENT SOME MORE .

Step 6: You share your opinion which could start like this, “No, you’re not an a**hole. I would feel the exact same way if I was in your situation— it should totally be equal.”

Regardless of how much more time you give to the situation, just by doing steps 1-3 you are communicating that her life and her situation matters, that you hear her concerns, validate them and express your care by TAKING THE TIME to assure her that you understand her feelings, even if you personally can’t relate to the situation.

This is the root of what it means to be an active listener in a way to show you care without jumping to advice or an opinion before you’ve you’ve conveyed true empathetic understanding of her situation.

If the words I use don’t sound natural to you, that’s okay! Use your words, and your tone to implement the same 6 steps and I promise that the person you’re talking to will walk away from the conversation feeling truly cared for, understood and loved.

I’d love to hear your feedback on how implementing these 6 steps can change the way you think and care for the people in your life!