My rule of thumb: When someone presents a problem that I immediately see a clear and obvious solution for, I don’t offer that solution. Instead, I hold space and listen for the pain or struggle that’s preventing that solution from being an option for the person.
When someone shares with me about a struggle, even if it’s an apparently trivial one, I often feel an immediate, almost knee-jerk instinct to share the first idea that comes to mind in response to their struggle. For example, if someone says, “I’m having trouble getting up for my alarm in the morning,” my brain may immediately suggest that I say, “have you tried putting your alarm across the room?”
To some degree, it’s not surprising that this is where my thoughts go first–our brains love to problem-solve and to feel like we have accomplished something tangible. It’s what we’re wired to do–to survive and get things done! But, it’s easy to forget that the other person–the struggler–is equally capable of thinking as I am, and also, has likely spent a great deal of time thinking about their struggle if they’re taking the time to share it with me. They also have a much more nuanced understanding of their own situation than I can hope to have just from a simple introduction.
Perhaps the person who is having trouble getting up in the morning isn’t struggling with hearing their alarm, perhaps they’re struggling with a deep sense of dread of a job where they feel like they have to wear a mask all day, or they have thoughts telling them they’re too much of a failure to bother getting up, or they fear interacting with their partner’s subtle digs at who they are, or they’re exhausted from a struggle with insomnia, or any other number of things.
If I offer them a quick, neat solution–even if I assuage my own discomfort of a problem being allowed to “sit” without a solution–I may steamroll the more subtle, nuanced and human pain the person was creating space for me to welcome. I may miss an opportunity to be with a person as they truly are. And, I may subtly communicate that I–perhaps even the world–don't really have space for them or their struggles or their pain.
I’ve been learning to take these simple moments of “here’s something that’s been hard for me lately” as opportunities to really know people and welcome their full, human experience. Sometimes it leads to a big, deep conversation, but oftentimes it’s a more simple interaction that isn’t necessarily long–it’s simply real. It’s real because it allows the person to be an unsolved, unfinished real being. It allows a person to be a person and not have to pretend, even just for a few moments, that they are completely okay.
The trouble is that being a human is hard. All of us have pain in our lives, even if we seek to keep it tucked away in a corner. And, when we do try to keep our own pain tucked away, the instinct to withdraw from the struggle and pain of others can be both instantaneous and powerful. Yet, if we slow down enough to consider the question, most of us don’t truly want to be people who withdraw from others’ suffering. We’re just stuck in the habit of doing so.
I think deep down, we all know this. None of us like it when people give us unhelpful obvious solutions to our problems, because WE know that there is more to the story, we know there is pain and struggle in our own experience that they don’t see. And when we do take the small risk of opening up about something that’s difficult for us, we often have a secret, quiet part of us just hoping that someone will really see us and know us and welcome us in all of our imperfection to be who we are, unfinished, unsolved, and yet okay.
So for me, not offering advice has become almost a spiritual practice, an intentional choice of welcoming and letting people be “unfinished.” I hope to communicate by the way I relate to others that there is space in the world for them to be all that they are.