This week Andrew reflected on his experience with empathetic listening. The subject he chose was his brother, who would be the best man in his upcoming wedding. Andrew expressed to me that his brother had dropped the ball in planning for the wedding. He had failed to act as a best man should in matters such as the bachelor party and as a result Andrew had to plan these things himself. I could tell from our conversation that the lack of effort by his brother to fill his role as best man really hurt Andrew.
In a conversation this week with his brother, he asked him why he had not planned for these events. Andrew practiced empathetic listening for his brothers responses. Although Andrew disagreed with his brother’s reasoning (that he was not sure what to do), he did not interject. Instead he tried imagining why his brother could possibly feel this way and as a result Andrew had a few “empathetic insights”. The first that his brother simply didn’t feel the same connection to him that he did for his brother. Secondly, that his brother was shy and the act of reaching out to Andrew’s close friends who he did not know well was hard for him.
Personally, I think that no matter how empathetically Andrew listened to his brother, the conflict and issue that existed would not be solved. As an outsider to the situation, I know that if my best man dropped the ball like this, the message I would be getting is exactly the one that Andrew got - “I felt such a strong connection to you which was exemplified in having you be the best man but you do not have the same connection”. This led us to the a very important realization, that although you can be empathetic to someones perspective, it does not mean you should tolerate or accept their behavior. In the case of Andrew’s brother, no matter which way you slice it, there is no justification that can fix the conflict that arose from the predicament. The best one can hope for through empathetic listening in a scenario such as this, is to recognize truths about an individual - who they are and why they act certain ways. And to some extent recognize that although we may want more from them, or although we may want them to feel/act differently we cannot force someone to be who they are not.
