What does it mean to provide support for someone? I mean, we all do it, when our friends need us, or our family need us. Normally we step up to the plate, we are there with a tub of Ben & Jerrys, Bridget Jones on DVD and several bottles of white wine. Obviously as a man, I don’t do any of the above, I come from a tough love school of support. Tough love meets empathy. Tough Empathy ™  I call it, and I patent it here!

Empathy is underrated. People often default to ‘don’t worry, everything will work out.’ To me, this is a lazy way of supporting people. It is so easy to say things like ‘Stay optimistic’, ‘things will get better’, when often, the situation proves other wise. I reckon there are loads of homeless people, lots of bereaved people, who when they hear the phrase ‘Don’t worry, things will work out’ want to punch the speaker in the face. Things obviously won’t get better, and you have no proof that this will be the case.

Then you have the other stock phrase, ‘oh, its only a little thing’. Obviously it isn’t a little thing. To the person you are talking to, it is a big thing. Often, a bad mood linked with a series of these ‘small things’ often results in a giant swelling tide of misery. From an external point of view, it is easy to see that if someone refuses to sit next to you, it is their problem, not yours. But if you are already feeling sad, and then that happens, it can feel like a shot to the heart. Yet if you were to ask most people about that situation, they would tell you to stop being silly, and suck it up. Which, when you think about it, is rubbish advice.

Yet we all do it. Sometimes it is so much easier to default to stock phrases because we don’t have to empathise, we don’t have to understand the person’s point of view. We can just trot out the same platitudes and think to ourselves ‘scratch that one down as helpful’ and we can get on with our days, feeling like we made the world a better place. But we haven’t, we have been lazy. We decided, rather than engage with this person we care about, we tried to superficially be positive, and as a result, were nothing of the sort.

The reason, in my opinion, why we do this is because it is easier. To actually emotionally connect with someone, and try and understand what they are going to, can drag us very much into their misery. We are afraid of this, because we don’t know how we will react, so it is easier to keep people at arms length. And these are people we care about. Obviously, I can only talk from my experience, with the people I know. I am not scared of empathising, to me, it is one of the few ways you really connect with other people. People often trot out tired lines like, ‘I get on with people’ or ‘I’m a people person’. Unless you are a sociopath, or a hermit, you are by default a people person. Yet when it comes to proper human interaction and connections, we avoid them. We reserve this key aspect to very few people, people we love, yet even those are kept at a distance.

What is the point of all this? Why am I writing about this? I think it is because we sometimes need to make more of an effort with the people we care about. I definitely need to do this, but I think all of us could do with a bit of a review of how we talk to people. We need to stop thinking that everything will be ok, and actually start listening to one another. How can we truly fix someone who is broken. The only way you can find out is by listening, and then answering honestly.

This honestly bit is key. We shouldn’t be afraid to challenge someone. Even if they are blubbing, and you can hear the snot popping, that is when they may need some tough words. They may take it personally at the time, which means you need to pick your words carefully, but in the long run, they will respect you for it.

- Anand