I AM NOT A CAR!/
November 19, 2007 I am not a car. You can’t just take me to a mechanic at a garage and have new parts put in me. The recovery process is not like fixing a broken piece of machinery. It is more like a long walk with good weather some days and bad weather other days. Sometimes the path is so far down between the mountains you can barely see the sun when it comes up. Other days you are walking on top of a mountain along the ridge and all seems well. You must keep walking even after the sun goes down and there is only darkness all around. If you want to help me, then walk beside me. The problem is too many people have the fix-it syndrome and only want to fix me rather than walk beside me.
I don’t have to be told that I have flaws and things that I need to work on. I am well aware of my faults because the world never lets me forget them. What I need as well as what my fellow sojourners need are fewer critics and more folks willing to take the steps along the path with us.
It takes the ability to see things from our viewpoint. That may sound simple, but it is not. Merriam-Webster Online defines empathy this way, “the action of understanding, being aware of, being sensitive to, and vicariously experiencing the feelings, thoughts, and experience of another.”
I don’t know how many times I have said in frustration, “If they think they can do it better with what I have to work with then jump in my shoes and do it.” I know I have said it enough times that my wife must be tired of hearing it, but I get tired of being told what I should be able to do and what I should do without being asked what I want.
This is not just a “poor Ed” piece. I am trying to convey the idea that if you want to be helpful to a person on their recovery journey who has a mental illness then you will have to partner with them not try to direct or drive them.
You have to change the viewpoint from yours to theirs. This gets tricky. I am always asked, “But what if they say something delusional?” “Are you saying I should say I see something or hear something that I don’t.” No I am not.
Empathic understanding, genuineness, and unconditional positive regard that were the tri-pod that Carl Rogers’ work stood on does not mean you reinforce or agree to any delusional thinking system, illegal act, or immoral act. It means exactly what it says.
However, telling a person that they don’t see a big six foot tall rabbit when they tell you they do will get you exactly no where. A simple “I’m sorry I don’t see him” is enough. It shows you heard the person and respect the person, but you have not agreed to seeing something you did not see. In fact we have been known to do such things as test mental health professionals to see what they would say when we say delusional things and then at times we are simply delusional, but when I look around me I sometimes can’t tell who the delusional ones are.
The point here is we aren’t cars. We need someone willing to walk the hills, deserts, marsh lands, flat lands, and beaches with us. Will you talk a walk with us today?
[There will not be a BLOG Thursday. Next BLOG will be Monday, November 26]
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