Elizabeth Morrison, an expert motivational interviewing trainer, returns to share best practices in empathy-based communication for virtual health care settings. This episode is for anyone who wants to learn more these key techniques for phone and video visits.
Elizabeth Morrison, an expert motivational interviewing trainer, returns to share best practices in empathy-based communication for virtual health care settings. This episode is for anyone who wants to learn more of these key techniques for phone and video visits.
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for anyone who's not yet familiar with CCI the center for care innovations, we cultivate innovation within organizations, um, delivering care and services to low-income, um, uh, community members, uh, by, um, helping to spark seed and spread innovation and best practices and safety net organizations. Um, my name is Alexis Wollensky. I am one of the, uh, program managers at CCI. today's topic is going to be practicing and pathic communication, and we're thrilled to be joined by Elizabeth Morrison,Elizabeth is an expert trainer in empathic communication and motivational interviewing and has extensive experience working, um, in federally qualified health centers. So with that, I'll turn it over to you, Elizabeth.
Thank you, Alexis. Hi everybody.
I wanted to just talk for a minute about empathic communication so the premise that underlies everything we're going to talk about today is that empathy is healing and judgment is harmful. And when I say harmful, I mean really harmful. Um, it, you know, it actually is, you know, it harms our health at harms our mental health. Um, it causes us to heal slower. It causes us to drink more, causes us to gain weight. You know, it causes a stress cortisol response when we feel judged.
And, um, often I talk about judgment being in the category of bias, um, implicit and explicit bias, as well as stigma, which is, you know, how we might talk about judgment in the mental health field. There's that language around stigmatized conditions. And those are called all kinds of a cluster of negative beliefs and attitudes that all of us have because we're all human. Um, and we've been the recipient of as well. We're sort of on both sides of those and empathy is at the other end. So it's sort of a Seesaw. And, um, typically the more judgmental we're feeling, the less empathy we're feeling for the person in front of us and vice versa, the more empathy we're feeling, the less judgment we feel. So, um, the research on this, I mean, I think as a spiritual principle, it's like the place that I connect with it really deeply and where I have spent most of my personal professional lives sort of deeply interested in this.
Um, you know, there is this sort of deeper spiritual aspect. I feel, um, there is very, very solid research on this as well. Uh, that I want to talk a little bit about, um, the power of conveying empathy, because feeling empathy is one thing. And then being able to communicate it effectively is a different thing. So there are sort of two categories of that. Um, and there can be difficulties in us getting to the place of feeling empathy, um, like bias and judgements and being in a hurry and being tired. There's all kinds of things that make it difficult to access our empathy. When we're mad at people, it's difficult to feel empathy for them. It's why we can say mean things to people when we're angry. Um, uh, um, and so there's one piece about getting to that point, and then there's a second part that when we have it, when we're feeling it, how can we most effectively communicate it?
And that's really what we're going to talk about today. And what we talked about last time was two specific strategies around that. And today we're going to talk about two more specific strategies because there's nothing I feel like that, um, is more sort of, um, heartbreaking even, you know, I feel compassionate for myself when I'm in this position. And then when I see other people, I feel like, Oh, where there's a lot of empathy in our hearts for somebody, and yet we sort of missed communicating it in an effective way. So the person in front of us, it doesn't feel it. And in fact, they might feel the opposite, you know, and so it was just like, you know, ships passing and it just didn't meet. Um, and when it is conveyed accurately, when people are able to really communicate this to another, it is incredibly powerful.
There is almost a hundred years now of research on the impact of empathy on health outcomes. And that was started by a car Rogers. Who's actually in the mental health field, a psychiatrist who did very, very rigorous, rigorous research on empathy and its impact on patients getting better. Um, and now in the last 20, 25 years, the great majority of research has actually been done in the medical field. So we have just this plethora of fascinating research around, um, you know, when empathy is effectively communicated around the impact on people's efforts, toward weight loss on alcohol use on depression, on self-reported pain measures on common cold symptoms, you know, the duration and the frequency. Um, it's just really, you can almost go down every health condition that we talk about a lot in the helping professions and see that there's some research on the influence and impact of empathy from another, and in particular empathy from helping professionals, um, it is very equal opportunity, which means that yes, there's a lot of research on physicians and the influence of when they communicate empathy on the health outcomes of their patients.
There's also a lot of research on nurses. There's a lot of research on behavioral health, um, professionals, and there's really good research, really good emerging research on medical assistants and receptionists. Um, so, so it's very equal opportunity. It has, um, it doesn't matter what position people are in. It has a really big impact on health outcomes. The second thing that I think is super relevant for all of us in the helping professions and seeing like how high they uh, it has a really good, um, positive impact on job satisfaction. So the more we're able to stay in that empathic place. And the more we're able to communicate that empathy effectively to those we work with the hierarchy job satisfaction is now this gets a little bit complicated when we, there are different kinds of empathy, there's affective empathy, which is when we actually feel what other people are feeling, and that is not correlated with job satisfaction.
In fact, that's actually correlated to burnout. So if you're one of those people that thought I do not, I do not want to hear, you know, any more talk about more empathy. I have too much empathy, and that is what is burning out. Um, that's the very particular kind of empathy and the kind of empathy where we're talking about is sometimes called perspective. Taking is sometimes called cognitive empathy. It's really when we are imagining how another might feel, as opposed to, you know, feeling exactly what somebody else's feeling, which can feel really overwhelming. Um, and then it has of course, a really big impact on patient and client experience. In fact, when we look at patient and client experience, it's actually always in the top one, two or three at the very, very minimum. Um, it's right at the top in terms of what people feel like is important, even in the emergency room where you would think the biggest thing is like how long the wait is and how responsive and, you know, you would think that wouldn't be the most major concern, it's number one in the emergency room. Um, so it has a huge impact in many of us I think, are working in our organizations to really increase, um, the supports for empathic communication within our organizations. And I think many of us have seen some pretty big leaps in patient experience as well.
So this piece about why does empathy, why does it have such a big impact on healthcare outcomes? It's really fascinating. And it looks like there's, um, three different and distinct drivers. And the first one is that when we feel like somebody is caring about us, we increase our self disclosures. So, um, if you feel, if we feel like someone doesn't really care about us, so they feel like they're going to ignore us or kind of dismissive, um, and then judging, you know, sort of at the end of that, of, uh, you know, um, a really sort of big stop sign for us. We don't, we don't make self disclosures. So I often I'm a recovering alcoholic. I almost never indicate that on those health forms, when they ask about, you know, do you have a history? Um, I almost never indicate it because I almost never feel like somebody cares in that moment.
And like, I'm in the waiting room, you know, it's like, it's a dentist's office. I haven't been there and nobody's smelled when I came in. I'm pretty sure they don't read these forms. So that's not necessarily feeling like people will judge me. That's more feeling like I, you know, I feel like it's going to be ignored and I don't, I don't want to disclose anything meaningful. That's going to be ignored. Um, I just got the East screening questions at my own clinic where I see patients, um, with a brand new man who didn't know that I was, I'm actually a staff therapist didn't know that. Um, and so I got a little window into, you know, almost like a secret shopper and I did not answer any of these questions, um, honestly, um, because she left her mask on, I couldn't see her face. So I could, there was no way for me to register any smiling or any empathy and, um, the way she was asking them, I just thought, no, I don't.
I don't think you know, so you can see that. In fact, when you think about who the people that you do self-disclose to, or the helping professionals in your lives that you feel like you can share, honestly, with it's typically the people that you feel care about you, and it doesn't have to be established over a long period of time as humans, we will typically make a decision within the first minute about whether somebody is caring about us and whether we're going to actually self-disclose. And of course, if we don't selfless, you know, when people don't self-disclose, then we can't really effectively help them, right? Because there's all kinds of important health information that they don't feel comfortable disclosing. So empathy increases important health disclosures, and that seems to have an impact on health outcomes. And the second thing is that when we feel someone is empathic with us, we're more apt to do what they recommend.
And I'm sure most of us have had experiences like this, where you go to see a helping professional, and they tell you, you know, what the recommendation is and you leave and don't do it. I've done this with medications, I've done this with labs. Um, I did this with like a specialist recommendation about my daughter, who, as soon as I left the office, I texted my husband and said, no, we need a second opinion. You know, he didn't even listen. And he didn't even listen as like code for didn't have empathy. And so when we feel like people care about us, we're really more apt to trust the recommendations, trust and empathy are very, very closely linked. Um, and so obviously this impacts healthcare outcomes as well. And then the third one is what I think is one of the most interesting aspects and this, that I would say the research on this is newer in the last decade.
And that is about physiologically. What happens to us when we feel like someone cares about us physiologically our bodies, relax, and our symptoms get better and our rooms heal faster. So if we think about ACE, adverse childhood experiences and everything we know about the physiological mechanisms that are at play, when somebody is in incredibly stressful environments in their childhood, um, is abused, is neglected. If we think about, you know, what we know about the processes on the body, it's very, very, very similar. Um, when we feel judged, we really feel like somebody is, um, that we're under attack, even if it's very kind of subtle judgment. And so our body fires up with this stress cortisol kind of protective response. Um, and so we just don't heal or get better as quickly as we could.
So,
Hi, I'm in talking about kind of specific strategies, uh, for communicating empathy.
And once we have that, um, these tools can be super, super effective for people like my mom, if she would hop on here, which she's not going to, who loves me dearly and doesn't have the most skillful responses to me. And I don't always feel empathy from her when I'm sharing with her, even though I know she loves me. And so that's really what we're talking about is when we have it in our hearts, how can we best communicate it? Last time we talked about reflective listening.
the second thing that we talked about last time, and then we also practiced was open ended questions. And this is one of the, I have been consciously practicing open-ended questions with people, with clients and patients, with coworkers, with people I work with, with my kids, with my husband, with my brother. I've been consciously practicing open ended questions for probably 20 years. And I still catch myself asking closed questions when I don't want to, sometimes we want to ask close questions, right? If you're standing next to someone and you don't really want to be closer to them, um, then we might not go into open-ended questions. I might not say to them, tell me a little bit about what you do if I don't want to go deeper or closer in that conversation.
Um, I might say, where do you work to make light conversation, right? Which is a narrow, very narrow question. So this isn't to indicate that open-ended questions are always preferable. It just means that when we've made the decision that we want to convey care and empathy for someone, then asking open-ended questions is a really powerful way to do that because we're indicating to them. I want to hear what you have to say, regardless of where it goes. So, um, we practiced these last time. We practice the questions that start with what questions that start with, how questions that start with, tell me more, tell me more about X, um, for people who have fears about open-ended questions like, Oh, I can't ask open-ended questions. You know, people will talk forever. I'm always behind, I'll get trapped on the phone in a room. Um, that tell me more is that is a great tool because it can be a very, very focused question and it's still open and allows people to answer, you know, in their own experience.
And then I put a little, you know, uh, over the Y kind of a reminder that even though Y is an open-ended question, STEM unfortunately conveys judgment, even when we don't need to, it always said feels a little bit like a finger wagging. Um, so, you know, why did you stop taking your medicine sounds really different than tell me about, you know, stopping, taking your medicine. Um, so, uh, and this is, you know, this is really true with kids. For those of us who have kids in our lives. If you ask a kid, why did you do that? That chances of you getting quality information back from that are very, very slim because it inspires a level of defensiveness. Um, so, um, there was two different strategies that we were going to talk about and practice today. And one of them is affirming strengths.
And also just those of you who are motivational interviewing train and or those of you who this just comes naturally to, um, for many people, this comes very naturally affirming strengths is, um, a really specific strategy where when somebody is sharing with us a difficulty, whether that's a client, a patient that we're working with, whether it's our brother-in-law or our teenage son, um, when they're sharing something that's difficult before we follow the problem, before we delve deeper into the problem, we take a deep breath, put on our glasses and look for strengths. It's like, I really think of it is put it, putting it on like a pair of 3d glasses. Like what about what they're sharing? What does that tell me about what is good about them and what their strengths are and what they care about and what they value?
Like, where is it? And it, and once you put the glasses on and look for it, things just pop out. So the adolescent who sits in my office and says, I think their APIs are bunk and I don't even want to be here. I kind of whoop hold on, put on my glasses. Um, and then all of a sudden, I see, Oh, you're really straightforward. I really appreciate your honesty. Um, you didn't have to say that, you know, you didn't, you didn't have to tell me exactly how you were feeling. So thank you, right? It's a strength. Um, when people tell us how much weight they've gained over the holidays, we know that that means that they care about their health, um, that they're troubled by this. When people talk to us about difficult relationships that they have in their lives, it means that they really value those relationships.
Um, and that they, you know, they want them to be strong and harmonious. So it doesn't matter what the difficulty is. We can find strengths. And when we take a minute to share with somebody, what we see it really, really makes people feel whole like, Oh, this person doesn't see me as a walking problem. I'm already feeling a little bit like that. Maybe I'm already feeling a little down about myself around this, and this person seems to me as good capable whole, um, so a lot of, um, often affirming strengths. These are, um, stems that are common. Um, we don't have to use these. These are just common stems is we might say I'm so impressed by blank, right? I'm so impressed by how hard you are trying to cook more healthy meals for your family. I know you feel like that you haven't been successful.
I'm just impressed at how much you've tried and stayed on this, right. I'm, I'm inspired by, I'm inspired by how open you are with the difficulties about your relationship with your adult children. I think this is really hard for many people to talk about, and I'm really inspired by the fact that you're just laying it out there, you know, um, to share with others. I can hear how much I find my, I use this one quite often. Um, when I'm listening to someone and I put my glasses on, I'll say, I can hear how much, you know, how important this is to you. I can hear how much you care about this. Um, I can hear how much, um, excitement you have in your voice about this. I can hear how, um, how, how, how deeply you've worked towards this or something, you know, to that effect.
So these are common stems. Um, I'm going to do a quick demonstration with Wes, from CCI, a quick demonstration, just so you know, we didn't, we don't have a script and I actually don't know what this is going to say.
And I was telling the CCI team right before this webinar started that, um, I always get a little nervous about demonstrations because I think it's really important not to practice your script, anything, because none of us are doing that in real life. Um, and there's always like this chance that all go a different direction or do something like that feels really unskillful and that's totally okay. Um, that does happen to me in real life. Um, so I just wanted to tell you that we didn't work this out beforehand or anything. Um, so I'm going to ask a Wesson open-ended question, um, about something that he has been struggling with, that he feels comfortable sharing with me about on this webinar in front of all of you. Um, so Wes, if you can, if you can share with me something that might have been difficult for you lately, that would be great.
Yes. Um, so I think in, in light of everything that's been going on with the pandemic, I, I hear this idea of like, just getting mixed messages. I mean, from external folks, from even within my own family about what to do, what not to do. Um, I live here at home with my fiance and we have an 11 year old who's transitioning to junior high. And so there's just so many things with his education and also with just what is okay and what is not okay for us to do. And there's parts of me that feel, um, actually a lot of myself that feels unsure that I, I can't like definitively say one thing or another, or support my family in one way or another for this, for the fact that I don't know if it's completely right, or the safest or the best thing to do. So sometimes I find myself feeling stuck or at like a stalemate. So to, and, um, yeah, it's, it's, it's been really difficult.
It's been really difficult. I, I can hear in what you're sharing, that you really want to be able to care and protect your family. You have a S like, it sounds like you have a strong want to really be able to give them the right information to help them in their own decisions to, to provide them guidance and good information. Then it's really especially hard for you right now, when you feel like you can't with all the mixed messages.
Yeah. Yeah. As, as a coal provider, it's important for me to, to, uh, certainly ensure that our family feels safe, certainly our child. And, and to know that I'm at least going in a particular direction that, uh, I can feel some level of like assuredness and competence about that. I also came to that decision that we came to the decision as a family or with me and my partner, but it's been, it's been really challenging.
Yeah, I I'm. So I'm going to try the, I'm going to try the impressed STEM, because part of what I'm hearing when West is sharing, is this feeling about his role in the safety of his family? You know, um, uh, as a, as a coal provider like that his role is, is really to put his arms around this family. And so let me just try it and see if it fits, um, West I'm so impressed with how thoughtful, how deeply thoughtful you're being about the safety of your family and really wanting to do what's best for them. Um, and what will keep them safe. Let me just, let me just pause for a second and ask how, how was that was,
Um, that was very reassuring. I felt that it was, I really felt I was being listened to, uh, I had also hadn't rehearsed it. I just only thought about what, um, you know, that has really been challenging in recent times and even currently, and it were, it just felt the sense of being heard and validated.
Good. I'm so glad. if I had said to Wes, well, you know, let me tell you where I'm getting my information, because I really trust this source. Have you tried just logging into the public health? You know, um, the, the, the public health text alerts and things like that. I feel like I just do that and I don't look at any of the other news and I just stick to that, you know, what about something like that?
It would've come off as something I'd probably heard, like another thing that I've probably heard from others. Yeah. Right,
Right. And it still would have come from a place of care. Right. Like, I would still feel like I want it to help you. There's something though about trying to solve the problem, um, that doesn't feel caring, even though it comes from that place, you know, cause West, would've probably been like, ah, yeah, probably would've checked out of the conversation a little bit. You're like, yeah, I should. You're right. I should do that. You know, we've all heard it. So I just wanted to point that out because, um, our first instinct, I think for many of us is to give advice. And so I just wanted to really, really encourage everyone as we practice to do whatever you can to take a breath and see if you can avoid doing that. And just affirm.
You.
So the second thing that we're going to talk about, and even while I was just thinking this through and talking with the CCI team about this and making slides, I was thinking, ah, this is such a huge topic. So I just want to put it out there and say, this is a huge complex topic. And I just pulled a couple of things out of it that I think are so interesting and things that I practice in my own life. Um, sort of one of my own rules about not to talk about anything that I'm, you know, not practicing in my own life. Um, and that is about repair. Um, so we're specifically going to talk about apologizing, um, which is one form of repair. Um,
So
One of the things about repair and the reason that I picked this picture of the Sox beam darned is because, um, there's a lot of research that shows that when two people end up in a successful repair, whether that's a patient who's mad about having to wait so long in the waiting room, and that's the only, you know, relationship right there, the interaction, or whether that's with our partners, you know, um, our decades long partnership that when we're able to successfully repair that, that relationship is actually stronger than if there had not been a rift or a wound. And that is super interesting to me, I'm a soccer player. I got my ACL repaired, like every other soccer player, I don't know, 10 years ago. And I can remember the surgeon telling me, you will never tear that ACL again, and you'll tell your other knee, but you won't tear this one.
This is going to be stronger than before. And even then I heard that, you know, I heard that sort of psychologically, you know, like that's so interesting. And I just had an experience with a team, um, that I was working with about three weeks ago. It was only the second time I've met them. One of them shared a difficulty, a difficult clinical situation. And, um, I thought we were doing clinical supervision and I didn't take time to affirm. And I went into a little bit of, kind of problem-solving and I could tell right away I missed the Mark. Like she was not, it was not what she wanted or needed. Um, and I got nervous about repairing right then. And I didn't. And then when we hung up, I just felt like, ah, I have to repair, you know, I just, I don't even, I barely know her.
Um, and I sent her an email and we picked up the phone and I just, I said to her, you know, really quickly I could see I missed the Mark. I'm really sorry. You don't feel like I launched into, um, trying to help it. Wasn't helpful. Um, and, uh, I said to her, I'm kind of hoping this is one of those micro tears where our relationship gets stronger as a result, um, at the end of it. And she said to me, Oh yeah, I totally dig scars. We're definitely going to be stronger as a result of that. And I, now I say that sometimes, Oh, I totally dig scars. You know, just the, just the notion that a rift, um, is repairable and can actually be for the good of the relationship I feel like is such a hopeful. Um, it's, it's such a hopeful concept to me.
So I wanted to talk, there's a ton of ton of ton of research, about apologies and repairing specifically in the helping professions. So in therapy relationships, in the healthcare field, there's a bunch, in fact, there's an excellent book directed at physicians called the power of apology that I worked for years with the CMO who bought it for everybody in the whole organization. You know, uh, everybody in addition to the physicians that is just amazing and kind of a great summary of some of the research. Um, but for, I just want to kind of clarify like definitions right now, which is an apology is when we say, we're sorry for something we did, um, uh, regrets, which is also an apology. Um, it's a particular kind of apology where we might not have done this. So if we think about, we all work in organizations, we all work in organizations that don't do right.
Sometimes by the people that you know, that we're trying to help, or that someone, um, you know, unintended on our end, you know, felt harmed wounded. They waited too long, nobody called them back. Um, they felt judged at their appointments. And so often we're in the position of needing to repair that wound. And we didn't actually specifically do the harm. So we're speaking on behalf of the organization, and this is really this piece of regret where we can say, I'm so sorry, you didn't get a call back. Um, and then the third one is wishes. There's whole candidate research on wishes, which is really interesting. And that's really that phrase. I wish things were different when we're talking to someone when there's nothing we can do to make it better. You know, we can't actually make amends or get them seen quicker or, um, you know, we can't make it right that they weren't called back twice in a row or that their medication never made it for refills to be able to say that, you know, somebody, I, I wish this hadn't happened.
I wish I could do something about this. I wish this were different. Um, we, I often do coaching for, um, physicians, particularly around chronic pain and chronic pain, um, D you know, difficult interactions around chronic pain with patients. And, um, we often sort of give them this phrase to put in their pocket, you know, I wish things were different. Um, I wish I could do. I wish I could do X what you'd like me to do. Um, so these are just, again, not scripted in any way that I know that's not helpful just to give some sort of examples and put some words to this. And the one thing that I will say about apologizing is that we all grew up differently around apologizing. You know, some of us grew up in families where there, there was no apologizing, it was like someone got the silent treatment for a week and then it never happened, you know?
And then you just go back. So, you know, this kind of just sweeping it under the rug or, or punishing, I say this to my daughter, sometimes you're punishing with silence. Um, but no apologies. Some of us might have grown up with a lot of over apologizing. You know, this often is where women get raised to sort of say, I'm so sorry. Oh, I'm so sorry. You know, like someone sticks with, put out and trips to me and I'm like, I'm so sorry. You know, um, sometimes we grew up where every time we apologized, you know, somebody wouldn't, there was no way to graciously accept it. It was like, well, why did you even do it, you know, where we sort of get punished for apologizing? Um, so the only reason I share that is that often we carry that into adulthood in our adult relationships and in our professional roles as helpers where, um, all of the different struggles we might've had or conditioning we might've had around apologizing kind of comes into our relationships.
And that's really why I wanted to talk about it today. Um, because it is such a rich area and it is so deeply important in terms of being able to, um, feel willing to engage in it, wanting to engage in and not being scared of it. Um, getting out of that, like it's admitting fault. And what does that mean? That sort of covering your butt kind of thing. Um, and being able to have some words where we can feel like we can do it skillfully. Um, so just as a quick note, in case, put it, put it under, like all of the things, you know, um, but you probably know, because we've all been on the other end of apologies is, um, it needs to include an acknowledgement. You know, something happens, it's an acknowledgement empathy. A lot of times that's conveyed by tone. So someone has to believe that we're sorry, and amends when, when it fits, um, all of us have been on the other end of these.
These are like the ones that feel terrible. I'm sorry if I'm sorry, you feel that way. I'm sorry, but in congruent tone, over apologizing. So all of these are sort of like pitfalls, if we can try to avoid them. Um, and then, um, I'm wanting to,
let me just then, um, practice for a minute with Wes again, on something that we didn't, um, we didn't practice, let me do a quick practice and let's, let's spend open up for discussion about this. Um, so I'm going to practice affirming strengths. So again, the same practice with different content. So I'm going to ask Wes to share, um, well, let me just say directly to us West, can you share a little bit about your current relationship with apologizing? What that's like for you? Hold on. That was a stacked question. Just so you know, where you asked two questions, are you close with your family? Are you close with your dad? Um, so let me start again and just do one question, um, West, can you tell me a little bit about your relationship with apologizing?
Um, I, if I just reflect on a recent time where I've felt like I felt the need, I needed to apologize. Uh, now, now I think in, in my age I feel, um, I won't apologize until I sincerely mean it. I think about recently when I just sort of like snapped and blew up my partner verbally and, um, um, sort of my first step in knowing that, Hey, this is my apology. Simply just like, just, just, just simmer down, really like for self, like I was just, just stop or turn away, walk away. I don't necessarily see that as an apology, but I, I know at least for a fact that that it's leading to there or leave that that's my indication of, of what, what I want to get off, um, communicating to my partner, uh, that I'm making steps toward an apology. And, uh, only knowing when I I'm fully calmed down and, and have thought it through. Do I, you know, come back at a later time with a clear, clear mind, clear heart to, to come back to apologize, but it's sort of in that sense where, um, sometime we'll have to pass, be it a few hours or even the next day, or however many long, how much, however, much long to be able to come back and talk about it more at length.
I can, I can hear so strongly how important it is to you to be genuine and sincere and that you don't like, you just do not want to apologize before you can be in that place. Um, um, I love that.
Yeah. That's important to me, I think. Yeah, just what you said about being, uh, like really authentic about it and, and, and that the right place. And sometimes it comes to, uh, the chagrin of my partner, cause she doesn't know, she might not know how I'm feeling, but I can just know that for myself, I need to space the process before I can actually come back and speak about it. But I also find some pitfalls in not knowing, uh, sort of giving her the markers as far as at, with regards to that. So we sort of say silent, silent from one another angry until, you know, I can come forward to apologize or she shares her part too.
So I just wanted to print something out, which is from affirming West from just not, I wasn't following any that, the content that, uh, any of the specific difficulties he was sharing, I just affirmed what I saw is good and strength in him. And just from doing that, then he continued to talk. He wanted to sort of keep talking and dig a little deeper in this. And that's really, that's really common, you know, that then people feel like, Oh, okay, you're hearing me. And you know, the way you're hearing me is that I'm a whole person and you're seeing my strengths. And then that makes me want to like talk more, um, to you and more deeply. So, um, thanks for, won't be willing to do that today, West of course.