Dawn Barclay

Helping you align all that you do with your core values

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Can We Learn Empathy? Teach It?

 We all say empathy is being able to put ourselves in anothers shoes, but do we?

Walk a Mile In These Shoes?

A simple definition (I think), for having the actual ability, motivation, and desire to see, feel, understand and perceive the world through the eyes of a fellow human being.

A little share…

Yesterday I met a close friend who on Saturday had to put their animal companion of 16 years to sleep.

If you’ve been there, you know how devastating and painful this decision is, (we all know how pets wash our souls with unconditional love and touch parts of us we never knew were empty, yes, been there too).

Their boss however doesn’t understand why they are so upset, or why my friend needs to take a couple of days out of work, it was ‘just a dog’.

Are they completely unconscious and unaware of the grief that is attached to my friends experience, do they really believe ‘getting back to work, will help them get over it quicker’.

That example is just a metaphor.

I’m not judging their boss, I’m just considering their empathy.

In writing this post I came across an article by John Marshalls Edwards The Empathy Paradox, which led me to watch his talk “The Global Urgency of Everyday Empathy” on Ted Talks, if you have time, please watch, it’s good.

The opening line to The Empathy Paradox (and the premise of his talk is) “I passionately argued that era of empathy is now upon us.”

And I agree with him.

I don’t know about you, but I hadn’t even heard of the word empathy in my childhood. Sympathy yes, but the two are not the same.

Can empathy be taught?

We can teach the theory and definition sure, but is it a skill that can actually be learned?

How would the world be different if we all showed more empathy?

Us humans, (unlike other animals) can look in a mirror and recognise ourselves, it’s at this point (around 3/4 years) when our ability to be empathic emerges. We learn that we’re an individual, that we aren’t all the same, that we are unique and different.

Empathy is about paying attention to another human being, giving them our focus and asking ‘what are they feeling?‘, ‘why are the feeling this way?’ and making a commitment to understanding what is happening in their world.

Unlike sympathy, empathy doesn’t require you ‘step into’ their world and feel what they are feeling.

Unlike sympathy, empathy doesn’t require that you have the same values and beliefs, it only ask s that you try to understand from another perspective.

If we all empathised more, I wonder what would happen? What kind of world would we be living in?

  • Less conflict?
  • Better relationships?
  • More effective communication?
  • Greater trust?
  • Deeper compassion?

How can we develop our empathic skills?

Pay attention. Recognise that all the feelings you have are present in another human being.

Acknowledgement (without sympathy). Validate what the person is feeling i.e. ‘I can see your really angry’ or ‘I can feel that you are incredibly upset’.

We’re all in this together. ‘This’ being living and life. Compassion is free.

Stay motivated. During a day we probably come into contact with hundreds of people: from family to friends to workmates to the person serving us at the supermarket. Be present at each social interaction. You don’t tire being empathic, but sympathetic, yes.

Share. Ask people to ‘tell you more’.

How do you feel when someone shows you empathy as opposed to sympathy?

Photo Credit: Katerha on Flikr (many thanks)

How Do You Feel?

Asking a person ‘How do you feel?’, touches just the surface.

Feelings are what hurt a person, and as human beings we are drawn to a persons pain, hoping that we can fix or repair it.

However, feelings are never the root or cause of a problem.

The ‘problem’ has come from how a person has perceived, recorded, paid attention to an experience or event (plus a lot of other brain functioning!)

If a person is in ‘pain’ caused by the feelings, here’s some alternative questions to ask

  • ‘how do you see the world?’
  • ‘how do you perceive the problem?’
  • ‘how do you know, you feel this way?’

Practice them on yourself the next time you say ‘I feel…’, follow it with ‘how do I know?’

Much deeper.

These questions can really get to the core of an individuals perceptions and beliefs, and allows them the opportunity to understand more of who they really are, and the ‘truth’.

Plus, if you ‘use on you’, don’t surprised if you can’t find any evidence to back up the feeling! Or if what you think you’re feeling, isn’t actually the feeling that is being felt!

Photo Credit Jon Hayes (flikr)

Assertiveness – What Is It?

To some, when assertiveness or ‘asserting yourself’ is mentioned it conjures up a lot of negativity, simply because assertiveness (positive) is confused with aggression, it is not the same.

What is Assertiveness?

Assertiveness is a way of behaving.

It is communicating confidently to others about your want, needs and feelings. It’s not about being aggressive or abusive, manipulative, or passive. It is loving empowerment, not abusing power. Having your human rights met without taking anyone else’s away.

Assertiveness by Definition

Assertiveness is a behaviour that expresses the person’s feelings, attitudes, wishes, opinions or rights with directness and honesty. It encompasses respect for the feeling, attitudes, wishes, opinions or rights of the other person.

Testing Your Own Assertiveness

How do you know if you lack assertiveness? Below are a few questions for you, answer yes or no:

  • Are you able to say no to unreasonable requests made of you? How do you feel when demands are placed on you that you feel are unjust and unfair?
  • Do you feel guilty when you change your mind?
  • Do you believe you are a confident, valued and worthy human being?
  • Can you handle difficult, awkward and conflict situations?
  • Do you feel awkward with silences?
  • Do people ‘hear’ you not just listen to you?
  • Do you feel awful if you make mistakes?
  • Do you have the confidence to ask people to repeat what they have said?
  • Can you communicate clearly your wants, needs, and feelings?
  • Can you persist to adovate your own and others rights?
  • Do you let others ‘put’ you down, and walk all over you?
  • Are you able to say exactly what you feel without any backlash?

Obviously if you answered yes to all the questions above, you are assertiveness. If you answered no to the majority, then perhaps a missing lesson for you is assertiveness.

Here’s The Good News

Assertiveness can be learned. It’s a skill once mastered last a lifetime. Yes, the ‘skills’ require practice and to fully use you may need to work on confidence and self esteem first.

Assertiveness Rights

View more presentations from dawnbarclay.

Photo Credit Me’nthedogs (thank you)

Life, I’d Like to Change It But

What? But what?

  • You’ve a wedding coming up?
  • You’re waiting until pay day?
  • Your youngest is starting dance classes next month?
  • Too much on the TV?
  • Getting your holidays over with first?
  • You’re just ‘too’ tired?
  • Haven’t got any money?
  • You’re just not ready?
  • Time isn’t right?

Can I ask you something?

What’s it going to take?

‘But it’s so hard’ you cry.

Yeah, it can be. Who said a change was a breeze?

The key is to embrace it, fall into it, let it happen, full on, come and get me change.

I’m not asking you how you’re going to do it (yet), I’m asking you what do you need to let go off, in order for you to realise that you’re worthy of the change.

You can’t learn to swim by not getting wet. You can’t learn to drive by not getting behind the wheel of a car. You can’t learn to get over a fear of dogs, sitting with a cat. You can’t learn to embrace change, without making changes. You can’t change your life, without doing things differently.

Scared? So is everyone else…

It’s not uncommon for people to turn their backs on the truth of how they are actually feeling or current circumstances because they don’t know or don’t want to face the ugly reality that they are so unhappy.

There are some that will ‘fill’ the voids with ‘stuff’ that will ensure that they never have to put themselves in a place where they have to think about their life, or where they feel fear. Fine. Do you want that? Really?

But.

What?

  1. But you don’t know where to start? Start here.
  2. But you haven’t got anyone in your life who can support your journey? Go here (external link)
  3. But you just don’t know what you should be doing? Here, please.

Nobody is going to change your life, in the way you want it, apart from you. Sure things change, but are you willing to let change happen around you, which you could’ve had some control over?

Command your life. Take authority for it. Be responsible for you. Own yourself. Stand up.

Sounds easy written down.

Sure does.

Is that another reason not to try though?

And, if you’ve let others and circumstances control your life so far, you may find it takes a little time to start living a life with you in the driving seat.

Is a little time to settle in, better than no time?

You can’t control external events, but you can control how you feel about them, we both know that.

Is this way of life abrasive? If you want my answer, then no, it isn’t.

Change isn’t about screwing everything and everyone else around you, it’s merely stepping forward and saying, ‘I’m in, I’m here, I’m ready and willing to play’.

If you want to ‘wait’ for the ‘right time’ and allow other events take their place, that’s fine. Cool. The change will happen anyway, I just wonder though if you’ll be on the right side of it?

Try this exercise:

Think of a current area of your life that needs to be changed. Just one.

On a piece of paper, write down in the middle the current situation.

Then just jot down words in response to the following questions.

  • How do you feel about it? (15 words plus)
  • What’s great about the situation? (there will be something!)
  • What’s bad about the situation?
  • How does the situation affect other areas of your life?
  • If the situation were changed, what would be there for it’s replacement?
  • What resources do you have (or can tap into) to make the change happen?
  • Is the change worth it? What will you be trading?
  • What will be different as a result of the change?

 

Standing Knee Deep In a River (Dying of Thirst)

I so wish that was my title, alas no, I can’t claim any ownership.

I was driving back from the doggy walk today and couldn’t turn the radio over, and the channel I was forced to listen to, thankfully played Kathy Mattea’s ‘Standing Knee Deep In a River (Dying of Thirst)’.

Not heard it?

Youtube video below for you: get your cowboy boots, studded shirt and Stetsons on though! Yeehaa! It’s very ‘country’!

I hadn’t heard it in ages. And it got me thinking…

If you’re proclaiming stuck-id-ness, in your career, biz, life. Would I be right in saying that you can ‘see’ the pictures (no matter how feint or perhaps not the dominant thought) of what you really want life to be like?

I believe there are different levels of ‘being stuck’, there is

Stuck definition = ‘I have no idea which way to go now’

Stuck definition = paralysis of action

Stuck definition = I know what I need to be doing and why, but I’m too scared to move

Sticking with the title analogy of rivers and thirst…

Sometimes right beside river there are ideas, solutions, resources, people, tools, but we’re so close to source that we can’t see them.

We can be standing looking out in all the different directions, confused and bewildered about what to do next, but if we paid attention to what’s happening right in front of out noses, we’ll see that our feet are getting wet!

They can be there, calling to you from the riverbank, throwing you a lifejacket, asking you to jump in a boat, but you are to concerned with the water all around you have lost the ability to open your senses to anything else.

Knowing how to take a drink is very different to actually bending down taking the drink.

Look closely at one area of your life for 10 minutes today. It doesn’t have to be the biggest problem you’ve got. Write a list of 10 possible solutions, ideas, resources, actions, people on the riverbank you could take, approach, ask for help to end the thirst. Take action on just one!

Take the hint.

I’d be interested to know, what would be your number one tip for unsticking yourself? Comments welcome.

Oh, and here’s the video as promised (youtube)…take it away Kathy Mattea! Go listen, I can wait.<

CV Writing Tips Lesson 1

  • Do you put off writing your CV?
  • Have you copied someone else’s because it was much better than yours?
  • Downloaded a ‘fill-in-the-blank’ template from internet and still stumped?

Are you proud of your CV or does it make you cringe?

That last question is actually the litmus test question — if it makes you cringe, chances are it will send shivers up potential hirers also.

Introduction

Depending on what age you are, you may have had the luxury of 1/2 an hour before leaving school in the company of the ‘guidance’ teacher (who hadn’t written a CV in 30 years) showing you how to ‘put one together’.

Or perhaps you were like me, and got out left before that day arrived.

I left school 25 years ago. However, just at the turn of this year I answered an email from a lovely gentleman who was looking for advice for their son, he said ‘they had half an hour with a careers advisor at school but that was all’, geez, I wonder if it was the same dude that was there in 1986/87!

Ditch the Emotional Attachment

I understand that selling yourself isn’t natural to many of us. which I’ve written about before, however, it’s the one time when blowing your own horn is expected. Employers and agencies are begging that you do it more.

Your CV and application forms are no place to hold back your best.

No one else can sell you as well as you can.

I would also recommend you never lust after and fall in love with your CV, some peeps are so attached to their written work of art and think it’s fantastic because it’s 8 pages (too) long and just looks great, all because they have really gone to town and back with Microsoft Word.

Adding borders, fancy swirl things and different colours to make it stand out will do that, but perhaps not in the positive way you imagine!

Bag a ‘Decent’ Email Address

If you’ve an email address that goes something like ‘hotlips@’, or ‘bigboy@’, or ‘upthe…@’, or you’re using your current employee email, change it. The first examples are tacky, unprofessional, and really say way too much about you even if you have hot lips and are a big boy, or both!

Better still use yourname@…try gmail or yahoo.

Personal Information:

Don’t include marital status, age, date of birth, the number of children you have, and Primary School. It’s against the law for an employer to ask you the first four, and they don’t really care about your primary school.

And you don’t need to type ‘CURRICULUM VITAE’ right across the top.

Excessive Pages:

This one is always up for debate, how many pages should a CV be? The standard is no more than two. Is your CV concise, relevant, and straight to the point? Brevity, if you can say it 1 word, instead of ten. Say it.

Think of your reader. Who wants to read twelve pages of all about you?

And if you are applying for a position that finds you pulling in experience from 15/20 years ago, I recommend the cover letter as your way of explaining why you have written that far back.

When it says ‘send a cv or apply online briefly describe your duties’ it means briefly.

Ditch The Comic Sans and Playing Around With Fonts Etc:

Keep it simple; your CV is not a creative experiment – unless you know the hiring employer is looking for creatives, and it’s expected.

I have seen CVs with eight different colours and clip art!

No snazzy fonts: Arial, Veranda, Tahoma or Palatino Linotype are easiest to read.

No different sizes, i.e. using size 8 to cram more in. Annoying huh? Size 12 or 14 at most.

Standard is Arial, Size 12/14 and black font or dark grey.

Unprofessional Formatting:

If you are going to use tabs make sure they line up. Think of your reader; plenty of white space and simplicity are best.

Spelling Errors:

I’m not the world’s greatest speller, so I am with you here if that’s you. However, your CV is not a place for errors; they stand ouet a mile.

Have at least three people read it, not for the content, but for spelling. And spell checks, as you know, don’t pick up every word out of context like this word hear/here or their and there, your and you’re. I don’t even see my own.

Read your CV backwards; start at the bottom and towards the top. Your brain will not be making sense of the words so it’s easier to spot mistooks.

Use Tables

Tables are very useful when writing a CV. If you spend forever trying to get everything all uniformed and in a straight line, use a table. That’s what they’re there for. (Just remember to hide the gridlines once done.)

Mailing In Too Small An Envelope:

If you print your CV on A4 paper, send it in an A4 envelope instead of cramming it into a tiny one three sizes too small. I kid you not.

Read The Advert (online and offline):

Never apply to the heading alone to be quick.

Most CVs get binned (especially online) because recruitment agencies and employers know when the CV and quick blurb has not been targeted properly. How do they know? Many online CV applications are digitally scanned for key words.

Thinking Of The CV As A Legally Binding Document:

A CV is not a legally binding document unless you sign it. Application forms are as they require a signature. However, there is no place for…

About Little White Lies:

Why bother?

If you have to create stories and magical myths and legends to cover the actual truth, then it does not say much about your integrity or honesty.

Out of all the employers I have worked with (as a go-between for clients) I have never heard any say, white lies are fine, all have said ‘be honest’.

I recommend you don’t do it and seek some professional advice if you need to. You are worth more than lies. Speak to a career coach? An employability worker?

You can lie on paper however I wonder if you would be as good at it face-to-face? Also as soon as you start getting paid and you have lied on your CV and get caught, it moves from being a non-legal document to fraud and deception, I’m just saying!

For example:

Adding qualifications that you don’t have.

Adding places where you didn’t even work.

Adding months to job dates when you didn’t work there.

Telling lies is not the same as tweaking to meet the job specification.

Lying about salary details, these come on your reference.

Schools, Colleges attended don’t add up.

Awarding yourself better exam results.

References:

Not needed unless asked for. Even then, submit separately.

Action To Do Today

Let me help you over the next few posts with your personal profile.

Call six people you’re close too, they can be family, friends or connections. Ask them to give you 10 individual words to describe you. Ask them to take it seriously! Keep them handy until the next post.

The above are very simple points, do you have any recommendations? If something is burning a hole in your brain, please share, you can do that in the comments below, don’t hold back — what you may think is ‘common knowledge’ may not be to another.