Tell Me Thank You

I have wanted to put some thoughts down on paper throughout this month as we have spent some time focusing on domestic violence awareness month, among the many other important focuses for October. So here is the thing... there is not enough space in the world to share how best to support people in their hard. It feels SO HUGE. There is NOT one magic formula that if you do exactly this, everything will come out perfect. With this in mind, I share my shortest blog post ever... acknowledge people when they share their hard. 

Brené Brown has this beautiful quote (if I am being honest, I LOVE lots of her quotes)... “In order to empathize with someone’s experience, you must be willing to believe them as they see it, and not how you imagine their experience to be.” 

We were all uniquely created and that is a beautiful thing. What makes you feel safe, heard, validated, known & cared for is not the same as the next person. I imagine if we were all gathered together, we could have a pretty large list compiled of our unique ways our needs are met. 

Just to clarify the title... no you don’t need to tell me, Brynn, thank you. You need to tell “me”, the person who just shared their hard with you, thank you. When people share hard stuff (diagnosis, abusive situation, rape, neglectful situation, an addiction, a failure at school, work or other hard in this life, it is hard to share. Say thank you for sharing that with me, whether you understand it, whether you have questions, whether it seems not to add up to you, whether this is a conversation between friends or awkward medical questionnaires, tell them thank you! It takes an unbelievable amount of emotional energy to share hard things. It is draining. It can feel like tattle-tailing. It can feel like no one will believe them anyway. It brings up those hurts again. It puts them right in front of them & they cannot hide from them. So if someone you know is brave enough to open up to you about their hard, you MUST tell them thank you.