This the difference between the dusk and dawn!
Light transforms and enhances our optic and vision!
In health care this light to me is compassion!
How do we communicate this to our professional colleagues and those in training!
Yesterday a medical student mentioned to me that, it is nine months since he examined a patient due to suspension of classes due to CVOVID 19. He surprised me with his words,' It is when we hear the needs and concerns of patients we feel near to them and feel with them'. What an insight!
I have sometimes felt the fatigue of listening and feeling. It is now 39 years I have been in my current role of welcoming parents and children to listen to them and find a way forward for addressing their neuro-developmental needs.
I was in a similar situation yesterday. A family who cme for to the Zoom platform for a consultation was so doing after two years. The family was distressed about the decline in the wellness of their ten years old son with 'unmanageable' oppositional behaviour. During most of the one hour the father and mother took turns to list all the oppositional patterns of their son. There was no way it could lead to a dialogue, as parents were woefully anxious about their current state which disturbs the family ambience even for their other child. They would come back for another conversation.
As I took a break of a walk for ten minutes after this, I pondered over this challenge we face! That is when the the sight of the lawn came to my memory. The lawn after the overgrown grass was cut and cleared, looked bright and warm in the morning sun.
Listening is a form of cleansing or catharsis that we can offer to families. The overgrown emotions of anxiety, disappointment, and grief would get attended to during the listening exercise. It is good enough to listen and not feel disappointed if one could not respond verbally.
Silence is the best response sometimes. With our silence we turn the story time in to a sacred moment of being in touch with the depth of a person who is ventilating. It is when we are silent the one who is talking is likely to listen to himself or herself, which is the beginning of self awareness. What they listen to while they talk, is the way too grow into that self awareness. That frees a listener from having to be a path finder for the one who talks.
Our crowded interior of thoughts and feelings need regular debriefing! The 'burden' of listening becomes lighter when in silence, we can observe the renewal in the inward orientation of the one who sought you to listen.
M.C.Mathew(text and photo)
No comments:
Post a Comment