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Soothing Sorrow

8 years ago3,053 words

I've been through a lot of heartache recently, and I've been trying to channel my own sorrow towards helping others. Strangers, mostly, on sites and apps that allow you to anonymously connect with people as a venter or listener. I've tried both roles myself, and it's led to a lot of thought about what actually helps other people who turn to others to soothe their aching hearts.



I recently had the chance to see the Pixar film Inside Out, which I'd been meaning to see for ages but never had anyone to go with. It seemed like the sort of thing that'd really resonate with me, and I wasn't disappointed in that regard. It's the sort of art I'd love to create myself; entertaining, relatable, meaningful.

There's one scene in particular that stood out to me as a wonderful example of something I've been trying to explain myself for years, and it's relevant to what I want to say here, so I'll describe it.

To briefly summarise the film in case you haven't seen it, the primary characters are personifications of a little girl's emotions who explore the world inside her mind. Two of them - Joy and Sadness - get separated from the 'headquarters' where the emotions are supposed to stay, and wander around in her memories, imagination and so on. There they encounter Bing Bong, the girl's imaginary friend, long forgotten and on the verge of disappearing altogether.

He helps them out, but as memories of innocent youth that he knew crumble around him, he realises his time is over and slumps down, despondent.



Joy, characterised by her bright and bubbly positivity, attempts to cheer him up by joking, getting him to see the bright side, being silly, and so on. He just sits there, unmoved.

Sadness - who up until that point had been seen as a thorn in Joy's side, a party pooper, one that taints all Joy sees as valuable - goes to sit beside him, and Joy objects because she thinks Sadness will just taint him too.



Sadness doesn't attempt to cheer him up. Instead, she's simply sad with him, and it brings out his own sadness, his tears. They reminisce together about the old times, and she hugs him as he weeps.



Having had a chance to get out his feelings, Bing Bong wipes away his tears and stands up with new determination, recovered. Joy is perplexed; surely sad people are only helped by cheering them up, by reminding them of the positives? How could it be that indulging their sadness might in any way help?

It does, though, and it helps far, far more than any attempts to 'be positive' ever would. Sad people (regardless of what they might actually believe cognitively) generally don't want to be 'cheered up', to be told the 'solution', or to be made to feel they're doing something wrong. They just want to be understood, for their feelings to be validated so then they have a chance to pass, as they naturally will in time.



I've been using two websites to talk to random strangers: Blahtherapy and 7 Cups. Both involve being connected with a random person either as the Listener or Venter, with the idea being that simply talking with someone is better than suffering alone. By relying on volunteers, there's always at least someone there for you, at least in theory. Blahtherapy seems to be more active, while 7 Cups seems to me more professionally-made and nicer to use.

As you'd expect with anything involving pairing up complete strangers from all over the world, results are very mixed. Some good, most... not so good.

I notice that a lot of the people who turn to such services are lonely guys, and I imagine that a lot of those are hoping to talk to a girl. I'm no exception; my heart sinks when I know I'm talking to some guy, not just because my life's been so full of them, but because they tend to give less tender feedback, telling you to 'toughen up' or how to 'fix' the situation rather than hugging you with their words. People ask me whether I'm male or female, and often disconnect when they find out I'm male.

I'd expect women to be more inclined to seek out such services because they're regarded as more typically affected by difficult emotions, while guys are supposed to be tough and stoic, or at least to not want to ~talk about their feelings~. However, I think this cultural assumption is one of the biggest reasons that so many guys have to turn to such things anonymously rather than confiding in friends. The fact that girls tend to be better-connected socially is a big factor too, I'm sure; they generally have people to turn to, while it's more common for guys to be alone.

I'm not able to find the exact study (the link to it is probably buried in one of my psychology textbooks somewhere), but I remember reading about how children who relocate are affected by depression differently depending on their gender. Basically, girls are more easily able to find new roots and social networks in their new environment, and so their depression is milder, if there at all. Boys, on the other hand, struggle immensely to make new connections, and tend to be much more depressed as a result if placed into a new environment and having to start from scratch.

A big part of this is surely females' predilection for nurturing and accepting others while males are more likely to compete or attack (though psychological aggression - such as social rejection - is apparently more common in females towards other females). Though I bet the fact that males are expected to be active while females are expected to be passive plays a part too. It seems typical - in my limited experience, at least - for many or most girls to have a list of guys in her life who treat her nicely, do her favours, offer to be her shoulder to cry on, try to win her admiration... all in the hope it might eventually lead to sex, of course (though I'm sure most guys would deny they were driven by such base urges). As guys are expected to be the seekers rather than the sought, few seem to have a similar list of female well-wishers or gift-givers (unless they're particularly attractive in some ineffable way, perhaps). If you've played multiplayer games online, it's a pattern that's quite obviously seen there; many guys play as female characters just to get the free gifts. I'm generalising here, of course; I'm aware there are innumerable exceptions.

But I suppose that's getting away from the point, which is how to help others in a therapy sort of environment.

Some people I've talked to have been - and I'm aware of how judgemental I sound here - difficult and stupid. One who comes to mind is a teenage guy who spoke in brief, blunt snippets about how he was 'bi' and how this was 'not normal', how he wanted to 'turn straight'. When I spoke of how it's nothing to be ashamed of, and how a few closed-minded people having irrational issues with same-sex pairings doesn't make it objectively wrong, he told me it is wrong because 'it just is'. When I asked how he'd be different if he were suddenly 'straight', he said he'd 'only get with girls' then. I asked what's stopping him from just choosing to 'get with' only girls, and he seemed confused, as if simply feeling some raw, base lust for someone is beyond his control and must be acted upon, meaning he'd do things with guys regardless of what he might consciously want or how he felt about the whole thing. Seemed odd to me. He just kept repeating 'i want to b straight' and 'its not normal' and so on, and disconnected in frustration despite my attempts to reassure him there was nothing wrong anyway. So that was difficult. I don't really know what I could have done there beyond what I did. I don't think it was a troll or a liar; it just made me aware of how the struggles of those with lower intelligence differ from those burdened by brighter brains.

(Also, I'd be a terrible therapist, I imagine, because I write about these things with no regard for confidentiality! Oh well, it's not like we'll ever encounter each other again anyway, and I didn't even know his name.)

Others who've tried to help me with my own loneliness issues have either said very little, or they've mostly just spurted out he same old trite aphorisms like "you've just got to get out there" and "you'll meet someone eventually" and "be positive, it'll all work out in the end". Others have attempted to reassure me by telling me that in their own experience, relationships 'just happen', and that they meet everyone through their many friends. Some have told me that you don't need many friends, just a few good ones... but I already knew this, and that's what I want anyway; it's just that such things aren't easy to find, and that's the hard part.

So in short, stating the obvious just feels patronising, and I wonder whether anyone's helped by that. Perhaps it's just because I had years of people telling me the obvious that it gets to me, though. Maybe others appreciate it more. I do understand that it's hard to know what to say, though, and why people say these things. They are trying to help, and I don't fault them for it.

Since it's open in a tab, I'm going to paste one of my conversations here, confidentiality be damned. I needn't label each line with its speaker; it's obvious which one's me (I was the Listener here).



Somewhat embarrassing looking back over my own words. I'm quite difficult! I can't imagine people enjoy interacting with me... At least not those sorts of people who want easy results without needing anything beyond common insight. Also, it's obvious this person was quite young, so that's surely a big factor as well. Interesting at least that someone so young would attempt to help out others in that way.

(It is annoying though that so many people assume the difficulty is in getting through a conversation or making a good impression... when the real difficulty is finding people to converse with in the first place, or at least situations where it's appropriate to do so.)

Though I talked to several people, and most were as fulfilling as that, I did have the good fortune of finding someone I seemed to be on the same wavelength as! We even exchanged contact details at the end, though I don't know if we'll ever speak again, since it's always odd meeting some stranger randomly like that. Hard to integrate them into your life without frequent unplanned meetings to build familiarity.

She (and I didn't know it was a she until we'd been talking for quite a while) was particularly impressive to me not just because she wrote well (good grammar, not too brief), but because she empathised rather than advising. She said that she too struggled with anxiety, that she had panic attacks when she talked to people, that she only had a couple of friends herself. She identified herself as an inhabitant of my world, an ally to face these challenges alongside, rather than a teacher or saviour trying to hoist me out of a pit. She understood the difficulty of the challenges, said "I won't pretend it's easy", and that meant so much more than those who try to alter how you think by telling you that it is really easy, either because it's easy for them or because they think 'positive thinking' is the solution. Overall, it was a deeply satisfying interaction, though sadly it made all others pale in comparison. I hope to find others like that, though.

I suppose my point is that helping others is most effective when you put yourself on their level, in their position. When you empathise and relate to them, let them be as they are, validate their feelings rather than dismissing them or telling them to be different to how they are. Spouting patronisingly obvious truths or trying to 'fix' things with banal solutions isn't effective, especially since anyone trapped in a certain position has likely thought of them all - or even tried them - before.



The reason I turned to all this is because I've been suffering recently. I've been lonely for years, lacking love, and I made the mistake of becoming overly enamoured with a just-a-friend who was already taken, for lack of a better target to aim my affection at. I never expected anything to happen from it, but I hoped to cling to the hope, the idea; having someone to fantasise about sharing a deeper bond with gave me a reason to try to improve myself as a person, to try to be impressive. I hoped to use it as a stepping stone until I found a mutually romantic connection, but... I made the mistake of writing out my private, obsessive thoughts in a place where they could be found. And they were found. And she told me bluntly and in no uncertain terms that such a thing would never happen, that even if she were single the idea of being with me was inconceivable.

Ouch.

I spent a day sulking in bed, emotionally wounded. As I said, it's not like I seriously expected anything to happen, but it was the loss of hope that hurt most. As if some flimsy stick I'd been resting my whole weight on had been snapped, and I'd fallen. Or something.

I turned to those therapy sites to vent, but since they were often unsatisfying, and I knew what it was like to want a certain kind of attention but to not get it, I thought I'd try to give to others what I wanted to receive myself. It seems a better way of channeling energy, that.

Sorrow is the soil in which compassion flourishes, it seems. Many therapists have tortured pasts themselves, and to truly help, you have to know how it feels to truly hurt.