How I Met Empathy

My childhood was difficult, but I didn’t have time to be sad or to feel bad for myself. Because of this, I informally learned to suppress my negative emotions, and expected others to handle their emotions the same way.  It was my goal to only focus on being happy.

In my final year of college, I was thinking to myself, “What am I going to do with a Bachelor’s degree in psychology?”.  With my life experience of resilience, having a mother with a mental health diagnosis, and having served a two-year LDS mission I thought I had the qualifications to become a mental health counselor. I decided to pursue a Master’s degree in mental health counseling.  Going into my program, my understanding of counseling was that you meet with people, give them advice, answer their questions, solve their problems, tell them how to be happy and have sympathy for them. NOT TRUE. I learned that counseling is about, listening, understanding, assisting others in exploring their strengths, values, and goals, helping them come to their own solutions on their own time, and empathizing with them.

Graduate school is where my journey of empathy began:

First, I recognized that I lacked empathy. In my second semester, our course work required me to show videos of myself counseling at my internship sites. One common theme in the feedback I received from my peers was that I needed to show empathy. I didn’t understand. At the time, I thought I had empathy. Well I did, just not a whole lot of it. I had gone my entire life ignoring all my painful feelings because I was always looking ahead for solutions, and I thought everyone else should do the same. I was still a caring compassionate person, with lots of sympathy, but I was overlooking the feelings of others and focusing on the solution. I learned a lot from their feedback. I learned that I could still be a good person, do good things, think good thoughts, have good feelings and still lack empathy.

Second, I googled the differences between sympathy and empathy. I even bookmarked a few pages on my internet searches. I looked up videos on the internet.  I found this one by Brene Brown very helpful, which I had also seen in one of my classes. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Evwgu369Jw

Third, I read a book by Brene Brown called Daring Greatly. I wanted to work on vulnerability, because I knew that this journey would be difficult and humbling for me. I needed to prepare myself to make changes.

Fourth, I needed to emotionally process my own life experiences that I had been ignoring. I scheduled and met with a counselor for the first time. I talked about my life experiences and processed through negative feelings I had ignored. It was liberating to acknowledge my feelings of sadness, anger, hurt, pain, and resentment. This allowed me to more fully feel happiness because I was no longer choosing happiness.  I was truly experiencing happiness by being honest with my feelings as a whole. This was a turning point for me because I could now recognize my own emotions and I could then recognize and be open to others’ emotions.

Fifth, I needed to stop trying to solve others’ problems. I always had an answer. I always had a solution. I could fix any problem, but I learned that others have the answers and solutions too. I learned that people want to be heard and understood first.  It reminds me of the video with a woman with a nail literally stuck in her head speaking to a man about the pain and problems she was having. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-4EDhdAHrOg. I was the man in this video. Clearly the solution was to pull the nail out. Obviously, she knew that there was a nail there but she wanted to be heard and understood.

Sixth, I became aware of my judgmental thoughts. These thoughts often began with, “I don’t understand why they…” or “can’t they just, do this instead of that…,”. These judgments disconnected me from others. Instead of having judgmental thoughts, I tried to understand how the other person was feeling by identifying the meaning behind their statements.

I am certainly not perfectly empathetic. I still have a long way to go. I will say that since I have strived to learn more about empathy I have found that I genuinely have better connections with people. I have been able to honor and recognize my emotions and the emotions of others. My personal relationships have improved. I feel a greater amount of love and compassion for others, beyond what I have experienced before and I am genuinely much happier. 

A Letter to Elaine S. Dalton

Dear Elaine S. Dalton,

You don’t know me, but I owe you an apology and a thank you. Let me explain.

Back in 2011 you came to Brigham Young University-Idaho to speak at Devotional and gave a talk “Dare Great Things”. I was in attendance at this devotional with my friend Bethany. I had met Bethany on a blind date back home in California. After 2 dates Bethany was clear in that she didn’t want to pursue a relationship but just wanted to be friends. I had recently come home from my mission and was used to rejection and I agreed. Fortunately, we both went to BYU-Idaho and I loved how I felt around Bethany so I decided that being friends and hanging out was better than nothing.

I would hang out with her just about every day. I would also go on dates with other girls and she was being asked out/going on dates all the time as well. I figured, I would keep hanging out with her and maybe I would meet someone else, but they never seemed to measure up to Bethany.

Going back to devotional, I was there with Bethany, half paying attention, half thinking about Bethany. Let’s be honest, I was probably barely paying attention, until I heard you say, something along the lines of “stop hanging out, and start dating”. I don’t think you said that exactly word for word, but this is what I heard. This next part, Bethany always asks me to omit from our how we started dating story, and I am embarrassed to admit, but without thinking or hesitation I formed with my hand the shape of a gun and pretended to shoot you. I even made the sound effect of a gun shooting.

Bethany gasped and smacked my arm and said “Shawn!”. In the moment, I was totally justified. You just told me that I could not hang out with the girl that I loved spending all my time with. I was afraid to ask her on another date because she had already told me that she wasn’t interested in me and I didn’t want to scare her off.

I went home that night and a scripture came to my mind, “And it came to pass that I said unto them that I knew that I had spoken hard things against the wicked, according to the truth; and the righteous have I justified, and testified that they should be lifted up at the last day; wherefore, the guilty taketh the truth to be hard, for it cutteth them to the very center” (1 Nephi 16:2). I didn’t think I was wicked, but I was certainly guilty of hanging out and the truth was hard, and it did cut me to the center, hence my inappropriate and unjustifiable reaction.

I felt terrible about fake shooting you and since I couldn’t apologize to you in person, I figured the next best thing was to take your advice. I asked Bethany out on a date. She asked me how it would be different. I said I would make it different. This was our second first date. I picked her up and brought flowers and wore my glasses. There is certainly more to our story, other people and factors that contributed, but that is the night she realized she liked me. That is when we decided to be a couple. This December we will have been married 5 years.

I am sorry for fake shooting you and I thank you for giving your talk. It changed my life.

Best,

Shawn Adame 

DISHMAN!

About a month or so ago, Bethany and I were talking about love languages while we were driving to the park. Bethany got very specific and told me she felt loved when I give her nightly massages while falling asleep (physical touch). She also told me that she felt loved when I did the dishes (acts of service). That was it. I said, "So basically what your telling me is that all I have to do is continue giving you your nightly back massages and start doing the dishes and you will feel loved?" She confirmed with a laugh and "yes".

Since then I have done the dishes every single day , with the exception of my birthday because she insisted that she would do them on my special day. I have given myself my self proclaimed name "Dishman". For the first few weeks I would make up my own songs about Dishman (the lyrics consisted of "Dishman" repeated in various tunes). I was so proud of myself, because  I committed to doing something that I knew that my wife would feel loved.I would constantly point out to Bethany, "look I did the dishes" to get some verbal praise. A month and a half  going strong I have been doing this and it takes about 30-45 minutes of my day. I consider it part of my daily schedule now. Which lead me to think, who the heck has been doing the dishes before me?  I mean I occasionally did them here and there.

For the past 3 and a half years Bethany has been doing the dishes. Not once have I heard her give herself a self proclaimed name like "Dishman" or "Dishwoman". Never have I heard her signing or reminding me about her doing the dishes. She just did them. Quietly and without complaining. To top it off, Bethany is a whole lot busier than I am. I have learned a few things from this experience. 1. Bethany must really love me if she has been doing the dishes for that long without saying and especially if that is how she feels love, than she was also expressing it that way. 2. To be aware of the small things your spouse or partner is doing for you and to express gratitude for them and what they do.
It is amazing how much people sacrifice for one another and often times it goes unappreciated or unrecognized. We all show love in different ways. Let us appreciate and recognize each other more!

Fortland, Pooregon

I would like to start off by apologizing to those that saw my last blog about my mustache, some people were grossed out. I hope that this blog post will be...better. 

So, because Bethany and I are still in school and working, we get really worn out, so worn out that we feel like we need to take a vacation. A preferable vacation would be Portland, Oregon because that is where all the weird people go, and we are pretty weird.

Unfortunately, vacation right now would not be reasonable, so we did the next best thing that poor married college students would do in the winter time to make it feel like we are on vacation, build a fort in one of our rooms and blow up the air mattress! 

This wasn't the most creative fort but it made Friday night seem a little bit more exciting. The first night we watched Downton Abbey and went to bed. The next day I found myself laying in the fort working on homework. Soon all my time became consumed in the fort. Bethany did not wonder where I was because she knew I disappeared in the fort. Sunday would be the day that we usually take stuff like this down because of school on Monday, but it still didn't come down. Something was magical about this fort. All of a sudden Bethany was telling me how she slept better in the fort because the blanket over our head made it darker. I was beginning to feel that the firm air mattress was more comfortable than our bed. When I did my homework in it, I would do my homework more efficiently. When I would eat,  the food tasted better. Ok the last one was a lie, but we loved this fort so much that we kept it up all week! Perhaps we just needed a week vacation or maybe we got lazy and didn't want to clean up our mess, I mean fort. Or maybe Bethany and I are just extremely weird for being in love with a simple fort, but I think that we can conclude that this fort was our best fort ever and there was something magical about it. Magical enough to be documented in a blog. 

Have a great week and go do something fun! If you have any fun ideas you want to share with us we would love to hear them! 

My Personal Stache

This is my humble story about my mustache or lack thereof. Let us start with the basics and history. I am a 23 year old man. That is about as basic as it gets. When I was in 7th grade I had friends already growing facial hair. I am sure you had some friends as well. I remember thinking they looked funny, but I was reminded not to make fun of them because once I get into high school I would have to shave as well.

High school comes around, still no facial hair. Everybody else  looks cool because they have scruff and of course all the girls like the scruffy look, but not baby faced Shawn. 

Let's fast forward, I am 19 and getting ready to go on a mission for my church. By then, everybody has facial hair. When you go and return from your 2 year mission you are to become a man.  One of the rules of my mission was to shave daily, I broke that rule everyday, because I didn't have facial hair to shave. 21 years old and I return home from my mission and I now shave my peach fuzz maybe once every 2 to 3 weeks. 

In anticipation for my beard and mustache, I do the whole shebang. I get out the shaving cream and lather my face. I then turn on the hot water and place my razor in the running water to get it wet. I then take the razor and proceed to mimic shaving my non-existent facial hair. It has almost become ritualistic, in hopes of one day having a real shaving experience.  

I am often questioned if I am some where in my teens, 14 being the lowest,

My friend and I last year decided that we wanted to do "No Shave November". I agreed to this idea, but luckily we talked about our idea in September so that I could begin a month early. I started October 1, 2013. November came around and my mustache was small. My wife encouraged me not to shave it and keep it till Christmas time because I looked manly. I finally caved due to embarrassment and it's creepy look on me and shaved it on December 30th, 2013

It really wasn't that long, this is what my mustache looked like after growing it out from October 1 to December 30th  at the age of 23 years old.

And yes the left side of my mustache grows in thicker than my right side. (your right, my left)

My wife likes facial hair but I cannot provide her with that, so to all the women who complain that their husband doesn't shave or to the men that complain about having to shave, consider yourselves lucky and be grateful for what you have.  And to my fellow baby faced friends, stay strong!

My Real Life Sleeping Beauty

About a month ago, I read an article that was popping up in my news feed about research that found that women need more sleep than men. You can read it here. After reading it, I thought "that explains EVERYTHING!"

Let me explain. If I were to look through your phone I might find a bunch of selfies taken in your bathroom mirror, or maybe a photo log of what you have had for dinner for the past year in a half. Not mine, my cell phone consists of multiple pictures of my beautiful wife....sleeping in weird places and positions. Here is my all time favorite:

We were on our way to Vegas from Idaho which is about a ten hour drive. After a few hours of driving I thought I would look over to check to see how my wife was doing, and then I saw this. I was expecting the classic, head tilted back with mouth open shot, but as you can see this is much more exciting. Curled up like a baby in a womb, with the seat belt still in place. At least she was wearing her seat belt right?

Keep in mind, if anybody gets their full eight hours of sleep it is Bethany. She is usually in bed bed by 10 or 11pm and up at 6 or 7am. But she is still always falling asleep during the day. Words can be hard to describe this phenomena of Bethany always sleeping, so here are more photos to demonstrate. I hope I don't get in trouble for this. 

SHE NEEDS HER SUN LIGHT

Accidentally woke her up

Because of this photo, one of her nicknames is baby fawn

At least in most of these pictures she is reading or doing some type of homework. I don't know if this is evidence that woman need more sleep or that homework is so boring that it puts people to sleep. Perhaps Duke can do a study on how often people fall asleep working on homework. 

Realize What is Important

Many times I see importance placed on other things rather than human relationships.

Le me give a few examples:

#1. A relative of mine recently invited my wife and me over for dinner at 7 o' clock. Because this relative lives in Vegas, it was only natural that there was a lot of traffic and I really don't know my way around the city. While we were on our way there, my relative called us at 7 and asked where we were at and why we had not called to tell them we were going to be late and in an upset tone, then hung up the phone. When we arrived, instead of being greeted at the door like guests, we were yelled at because they had took the time to make food and now it was cold and dinner was ruined. What happened here was they placed more value and importance on food than my wife and I, who are people with feelings. We didn't mean to be late, and instead of being happy that we even came over or glad that were weren't involved in a car accident, they yelled at us and made us feel like crap. We still apologized, using this concept of the importance of their feelings and trying to understand why they were upset. 

#2. I notice often that a lot of families strive to get to church on time. When you have a ton of kids ( or no kids at all) it seems pretty hard to do though. At least that is what I have noticed from observation. I often see families stroll in upset with each other because they didn't get their on time. I always felt like church was a place for families to feel love and be happy together, so I think that people should remember that. Its ok to show up late, church isn't about being on time, it's about families, although being on time would be nice, don't let your tardiness defeat the whole reason why you came to church in the first time. 

 I have learned that we all make mistakes. People break things, have accidents, or accidentally insult you. I always try to remember the importance of the human relationship though. That is something that can not be destroyed because when it is, it is hard to be repaired. If my wife were to go crash our car into a pole today, what would my reaction be? Would I be mad that she ruined our car or would I be concerned if she were OK. If I were to be mad, I would be placing importance and value into the car over the importance and value of my wife. Inside we would all say that we would care for the person, but sometimes emotions take control of you in these moments. 

Think about your relationships with people and where they are on your importance scale, especially the ones that are closest to us. Let us be forgiving, loving, understanding, and accepting of others.  Try to recognize moments when you make this mistake of valuing objects and time over the value of  people and see if by recognizing them and trying to remember not to do that, if it doesn't help change your relationships with others.