Empathy is a stress reducing trait in anyone, especially in childrens for Stress for SuccessSeptember 3, 2013

Empathy means understanding, compassion and responsiveness. When you’re upset and someone empathizes with you, your load is lightened - at least a little.

Like my six travel weeks from hell when I experienced seven flight cancellations forcing me to travel all night five times to get to my next destination in time for my 9:00 a.m. workshop start time. Toward the end of these exhausting and very stressful weeks I landed in Toronto around midnight, which was OK since this trip didn’t involve any cancelled flights. I got a cab quickly and gave the driver the address of my hotel. We arrived at the address only to find that it was a convention center with no hotel. “Of course,” I thought. The driver took me to the nearest hotel, but, there were no available rooms. “Of course,” again. The hotel staff called other nearby hotels to find me a room then had their bus driver take me to one with a vacancy. This was excellent service, which helped alleviate some of my exhaustion.

But do you know what really lifted my spirits? As I got onto the bus the driver said to me, “Tough day, huh?” He hit the nail on the head (although “tough month” would have been closer). My exhaustion lifted considerably and my usual optimistic attitude returned. It was miraculous!

Showing empathy toward others can be just that – miraculous, especially for the person on the receiving end of it. In fact, without this human trait relationships would eventually erode.

Encouraging this trait in your children is very important to their ability to coexist. When they can see life through another’s eyes and make a good guess as to what that other person is feeling and convey it to that person, it connects them together. Practiced regularly, empathy keeps us civil, discourages cruelty and allows trust and cooperation between people to build. It makes the world a better place in which to live.

In past weeks I’ve covered the importance of teaching kids empathy along with some ideas on how to teach it to them (past articles at http://stressforsuccess.blogspot.com):

·         Empathic kids are good at regulating their own emotions;

·         By helping your kids get their own emotional needs met at home and teaching them how to bounce back from stress, you make it much easier for them to develop a strong sense of empathy towards others;

Here are two additional ways to teach empathy.

Model empathy yourself

Always remember that you are your kids’ number one role model during their most formative years. To anchor empathy in them, model it toward others yourself. Do this when your children are younger before you lose influence over them.

Family systems therapy teaches us that children take on roles based on their parents’ roles. So, if you express empathy toward them rather than being judgmental, they can relax and open up. If you’re more judgmental they’ll likely get defensive with a fight (argue) or a flight (withdraw) reaction to you. To get a different response from them you need to change your response to them first. For example, bullying has become very pervasive. When you and your children witness this in real life or on TV, instead of ignoring it change your role to discussing how that person must feel. Developing empathy for the victim helps them to be less likely to bully anyone themselves.

Help kids identify common ground

A very natural human tendency is to feel the most comfortable with others who look and act like you yourself do. Suspiciousness of differences evolved over the millennia to help our ancestors survive.

The down-side however, is with others who are different from you in age, race, gender, etc., it may be more difficult to give them the benefit of the doubt. When you notice your kids being more judgmental of those who are different, encourage them to identify how they and the other are actually more similar than they realize. My mother used to ask us to guess why another kid might be behaving badly to help us think beyond our initial and judgmental assumptions.

To impact your children’s empathy development parents must look for opportunities to model empathy and to identify commonalities versus differences. The reward will be not only a better world but a better family life, as well.

Jacquelyn Ferguson, M. S. is an international speaker and a Stress and Wellness Coach.  Order her book, Let Your Body Win: Stress Management Plain & Simple, at http://www.letyourbodywin.com/bookstore.html.  Email her to request she speak to your organization at jferg8@aol.com.