Trading Places: the power of empathy

“The boys’ bedrooms are freezing,” I snapped.

“I know, I’m trying to figure out this new thermostat,” Les replied as he fiddled with the gizmo on the wall. We’d just moved into a new home after two years of planning and building.

“I liked our old thermostat where you just set the temperature and that was it,” I said as Les was trying to figure out our newfangled heating system.

“I understand, but this one’s better,” Les responded. “We’re just going to need to figure it out.”

“Well, I’m not having my boys sleep in those cold rooms tonight,” I said. “They’ll both wake up with pneumonia.”

Les looked at me, as if to say, Really? Don’t you think you might be exaggerating just a bit?

“I mean it,” I continued, “this is crazy!”

“Leslie, take a deep breath,” Les said in a calm but stern voice. “Nobody’s getting pneumonia.”

“It’s like a freezer in there! Seriously!”

“I know,” Les said. “That’s why I’m working on it, but we’ve got to give it time to heat up.”

“I don’t even know why you had to have this fancy thing.” “What?! You think I had to have this?” Les asked. “We were both there when the guy said it worked great. You and I agreed on it.”

“All I know is that my little boys’ rooms are ice-cold.” With that, I turned on my heel and walked away. “Where are you going?” “To find more blankets.”

Truth is, those boys’ rooms weren’t nearly as chilly as our interaction. And why is that? Could it be that what I was really upset about was not the newfangled thermostat? Could it be that my emotions were running high because they were being fueled by another concern that wasn’t being voiced?

Bingo!

In our crabby conversation about the thermostat, the main issue for me was not the immediacy of getting my boys’ rooms warmed up. Any sane person knows it will take awhile for a furnace to do its work. I also knew Les was working hard to improve the situation. That was obvious. And, yes, I was present and cast my favorable vote when we were deciding on our heating system. I had no right to blame Les for it. So why was I being so emotional? Why was I making my husband my adversary instead of my teammate?

I can tell you, now. And so can Les. The answer was found just beneath the surface of my outward emotions. In fact, as I was rummaging through our moving boxes to find our blankets, Les, very gently, came to me for a little emotional excavation.

“I wish we could put our hands on that Hudson Bay blanket we got in Calgary last year,” he said.

I didn’t respond.

“And I wish Jackson didn’t have an ear infection,” Les continued.

“I know,” I piped up. “That’s what’s really concerning me.”

“I know it is,” Les said in a comforting voice. “Not to mention the fact that it’s a week before Christmas and we don’t have a tree, let alone groceries, and my parents are flying in tomorrow.”

“Exactly,” I said with relief (he understands). “This is the craziest timing ever.”

“It’s not a Norman Rockwell Christmas, that’s for sure,” Les quipped as he gently put his hands on my shoulders.

“Nope,” I replied with a smile, “but if we’re lucky, it might snow in our boys’ rooms tonight.”

“We can only hope,” Les said deadpan, without missing a beat.

That was it. A brief moment of empathy from my husband turned our off-kilter mood around. Within a minute’s time we were back on the same page, feeling connected.

Now I can almost hear you saying, “What moment of empathy?” Did you miss it? Were you expecting something more psychologically sophisticated? Empathy doesn’t necessarily require anything more than letting your spouse know, with compassion, that you recognize what’s going on inside of them. And that’s exactly what Les did for me. Rather than trying to reason with me on the technicalities of how an HVAC system works, he revealed my true concerns about our family and Christmas in a caring tone. That’s all it took to get me back on track.

But here’s the thing. Les could have never done this if he was not aware of his own emotional terrain. He would have been unable to reflect back to me my concerns if he wasn’t aware of feeling stressed out about the move himself.

Trading Places: The Best Move You’ll Ever Make in Your Marriage by Les and Leslie Parrott