00:00 

Hey there, welcome to Intentional Living with Tanya Hale. This is episode number 231, "Other People's Pain." Welcome to your place for finding greater happiness through intentional growth, because we don't just fall into the life of our dreams...we choose to create it. This is Tanya Hale and I'm your host for Intentional Living. 

00:20 

Alright, welcome to the podcast today. It's nice to have you. Thank you for being here. Thank you for continuing to show up and be part of my life and thank you for sharing this podcast with others. I get a lot of sharing going on. That's kind of how this gets put out there and I appreciate the growth of this podcast and getting this information out there. It's just so important to me, as I've seen how this information has impacted my life for the better. I love that I get to share these pieces of information with you, and I love that as they change your life that you're sharing them with other people as well. So thank you. 

00:59 

We are going to jump in today. I love this topic. It was really resonated with me the last few weeks. You know how sometimes there are lessons that God really needs us to hear? And I recognize it for me because it kind of keeps showing up in my life and this is the case with today's topic. Although I've known it before, it was shown to me this week in a different context and in several different circumstances. So the reminder that I received was this: When people have hurtful or dysfunctional behaviors, it's not generally because they are intentionally trying to make people's lives hard or intentionally trying to be hurtful. People very often act the way they do because of pain. When we put emotional pain in the feeling line of a thought model, we can see how it will show up in the action line as being defensive, curt, emotionally disconnecting, lashing out, saying hurtful things, those types of behaviors. We don't usually engage in dysfunctional or hurtful behaviors when we are feeling safe or secure or confident or loved. And this was pointed out to me this week while sitting in an advanced coaching class. 

02:06 

We were watching a video of one of the other coaches working with a client and the coach was saying that she was struggling to feel compassion for the client because she was pushing back so much and there seemed to be a tug of war going on between the client and the coach. And the coach who was leading the discussion stopped the video on the face of the client and asked what we saw. And all of us agreed that we could see a lot of pain on her face. And we then received the reminder that as coaches, people bring us their problems because they are in pain. They are hurting and they don't know how to move out of it. And when they're hurting, they are most likely engaging in some hurtful dysfunctional behaviors. We oftentimes create problems in our lives because we're in pain. Emotional pain can feel like insecurity, a lack of confidence, a fear of rejection, feeling insignificant or unimportant, feeling like we're not being seen or heard, feeling misunderstood and a host of others. And these types of emotions create behaviors that can seem hurtful, disconnected, rude or annoying. The struggle most of us have is that we tend to focus on the behaviors of others rather than focusing on the reason for the behavior, which is very often pain. 

03:23 

I know when I taught middle school, the first year or so, I started off teaching and focusing mostly on the behaviors. So when a student would act out or behave in a disruptional way in my class, I would take them out and I would just let into them about their behaviors. I'm not super, super mean, but a little, little stern, sterner than I, than I look back and I feel comfortable with a little bit like, "listen, you're not going to behave in my class that way. This is unacceptable. You don't do this." And about a year into teaching, I was in my early 40s. I don't remember how it happened, but I realized that there was something else going on, not just behavior. And so when a student would be struggling behavior wise in my class, I would pull them out into the hall and I would say, "listen, this isn't normal. And I'm concerned. Is there something going on that I can help you with? What's happening for you?" Something along those lines. And inevitably that student would get really sober. They would sometimes start to cry and they would usually just say, "you know, things are just really tough right now at home." And "they're, they're, you know, tough. I broke up with my boyfriend," or whatever it was, but it was always interesting. I think one of the most heart wrenching ones I had was a student who had just been pushing, pushing, pushing all week long. And finally it was about Thursday and I took him out into the hall. and I was like, "listen, this is not normal and I don't like what's going on between us. What's happening here for you?" And he started to cry and he said, "my brother died earlier this week," and my heart as a teacher just about died because I was so...felt so much grief for how I had struggled with him all week and the thoughts that I had had about how honored I was. And when I realized that he was in that much pain, it was just such a huge eye-opening experience for me. And that became the way that I worked with my students when they struggled with behaviors. I learned to focus on the feeling...what was happening for the student on the inside rather than the behaviors. 

05:41 

And in our relationships, we often tend to do the same kind of thing. We look at the behaviors that are dysfunctional behaviors that are unkind, dismissive, disconnected, distanced, curt, aggressive, harsh, and we get all out of sorts about them, right? Because their actions then move into our circumstance line. And we get to have thoughts about them. And very often our thoughts will tend toward things like, "they are just so rude, I can't believe them. They're so insensitive. Don't they see that I'm really trying here? How can they be so selfish?" And here's what's fascinating. If you put any of those thoughts in your own thought line, we can see how it plays out. So if we have the thought, "they are so selfish," the feeling often becomes something like indignant. The action: then we act against them. We try to prove them wrong. We may call them out. The end result is that we are acting selfish. Do you see how that works? 

06:42 

Let's do another one of those thoughts. Let's use the thought "they're so insensitive." And then we feel hurt. And then actions: maybe that we push back. We dismiss them. We ignore them. We disconnect. The end result, we are then the one who is insensitive. We become insensitive to their pain. Our thought line ends up in our result line. Do you see how that works? We think they're insensitive and then our result is that we become insensitive. We end up behaving in a way that aligns with our thought. In General Conference last month, Annette Davis shared this. This is the quote: "The story is told of a man named Jack who had a beloved bird hunting dog named Cassie. Jack was so proud of Cassie and often bragged about what a skilled dog she was. To prove this, Jack invited some friends to watch Cassie perform. After arriving at the hunting club, Jack let Cassie out to run around while he went inside to check in. When it was time to begin, Jack was anxious to show off Cassie's amazing skills. However, Cassie was acting strangely. She wouldn't obey any of Jack's commands as she usually did so willingly. All she wanted to do was remain by his side. Jack was frustrated and embarrassed and angry with Cassie. Soon he suggested they leave. Cassie wouldn't even jump into the back of the truck. So Jack impatiently picked her up and shoved her in the kennel. 

08:05 

"He fumed as those with him made fun of his dog's behavior all the way home. Jack couldn't understand why Cassie was misbehaving. She had been trained well and her whole desire in the past had been to please and serve him. After arriving home, Jack began examining Cassie for injuries, burrs, or ticks as he usually did. As he put his hand on her chest, he felt something wet and found his hand covered with blood. To his shame and horror, he found that Cassie had a long wide gash right to her chest bone. He found another on her right front leg, also to the bone. Jack took Cassie into his arms and began to cry. His shame at how he had misjudged and treated her was overwhelming. Cassie had been acting uncharacteristically earlier in the day because she was hurt. Her behavior had been influenced by her pain, her suffering and her wounds. It had nothing to do with a lack of desire to obey Jack or a lack of love for him." 

09:01 

I love that story. It came in the course of this week when I was pondering this idea of other people's pains and their behaviors and their thoughts. And then as I was listening to Conference talks, this one came across and the timing was as usual, exactly as it should have been. I don't know a lot of people, if any, who are intentionally hurtful and unkind. Most people I know really are just doing their best to live life. And sometimes the pain is so intense that it clouds their ability to act in ways they normally would or that any normal emotionally healthy person would. This dog, Cassie, wasn't intentionally seeking to embarrass her owner. She was hurt and just needed some love and attention, some healing. When we are in pain, our primitive brain starts to freak out a bit and it is seeking for relief in any way that it can find. And remember, if it doesn't, our primitive brain doesn't have this right, wrong, good, bad filter going on. It just starts looking for any solution it can think of. That's why when money is super tight or non-existent, the thought will cross your mind to rob a bank or a store. Right? It's not something you would do, but the brain just starts looking for any solution. When we are in pain, our brains do the same, looking for any solution to end the pain without a moral filter. In some circumstances, we have learned to monitor our responses to our primitive brains. We wouldn't rob a bank, but all of us are unaware at some point, especially when the solutions our brain gives us is in a, when it's in a pretty fuzzy, gray area. 

10:41 

Someone who has turned to drugs or alcohol or pornography in the past will find that when they are in pain, they will be able to see the pain, one of the first places their primitive brain will look for relief will be in those areas. Our brain wants the pain to go away right now. And what is the quickest way to find relief? Also, when we're in pain, it really clouds our ability to think clearly, to see level headed solutions. So when I have a client who is really struggling with a tough emotion, I will just have them sit with the emotion for a bit, work at detaching themselves from all of the thoughts surrounding the emotion, why it's there, what's causing it, what they're going to do, right? Turn all that off and just focus on the feeling where it is in their body, how it feels, is there a color, a weight, a movement of sound, etc. associated with the feeling? And usually after two to three minutes, the feeling starts to dissipate. And then their brain can think clearly to start coming up with solutions and resolutions. But when they're in acute pain, processing what is reasonable is often not even an option. Our brain is just back there saying, "quick, anything, get out of this pain as quick as possible," right? Our brain gets panicky. It can be even easier to see in ourselves sometimes because we know when we're in pain and not on our best behavior, and we can sometimes be really lenient when we know that we're feeling really sick or when we're in emotional pain, and we give ourselves grace for our poor behavior. 

12:11 

But especially with emotional pain, we rarely know that it's there for other people. And all we see is the behavior, and we get really judge-y about it. And then we start to make up stories about why they're acting the way they are. And unfortunately, we don't look to the emotional pain first. We start coming up with reasons like, "oh, they're just so selfish." But what if we were able to see past the behavior and look at their story to see the pain behind the behaviors? When we can begin to see the behaviors as a smoke screen for hiding pain, it becomes much easier for us to show up empathetic, kind, compassionate, and loving. And then rather than blowing up in response to their behaviors, we slow down. We take a breath and we ask them how they are. We set the business of behaviors aside and we step into the personal response to pain. If we put their behavior into our circumstance line, and our thought about their behavior is centered on possible pain, such as "something doesn't seem okay with them, this isn't normal behavior," then that creates something like compassion or maybe curiosity in our feeling line, which then has us showing up more the kind of person we want to be rather than reacting to someone else's questionable behavior. 

13:34 

So let's take a minute to apply this to us. All of us have times in our past when we have not shown up the way we wish we would have. We especially start to see this past of poor behavior the more we do this work. I know for me, my previous marriage is a place where I go to find a lot of work that I need to do. And when we notice past behavior, if we can just take a minute to acknowledge the pain that spurred those behaviors, then we can find it being a helpful place. So maybe you had some serious marital problems or got divorced and engaged in some behavior that now you wish you wouldn't have behaved in. So I want you first of all to just take a minute to acknowledge the pain you were in during that time. You might have been feeling really lonely, very unworthy or very unlovable. There is most likely some grief or some guilt or some shame. These can be very strong, powerful, painful emotions. And without awareness, when we feel these emotions, we are not usually thinking really clearly and our brain starts wanting to do anything it can to alleviate the pain. You probably had some really good reasons for engaging in the behaviors that you did. Most likely you weren't trying to hurt anyone. You were just desperate for some relief from the pain and anguish. So of course you didn't make the best of decisions. 

15:02 

You know what? I look back at times where I became very passive-aggressive or very manipulative and it was in response to pain that I was feeling, a desperateness to be seen, to be heard, to be acknowledged for being a person of worth. Right? And that's what created some of my most dysfunctional behaviors. And guess what? It's okay. Just because with a clear mind we didn't know better doesn't mean that with a mind clouded with pain, I'm going to know better. I know as I look back to many 

of my behaviors that I was in a lot of pain. And my thoughts and feelings and reactions which were not helpful or healthy and were in a direct response, they were in direct response to the pain I felt. And not knowing a better, healthier way to deal with it, I just went with what came to my mind. I was trying desperately to get out of pain all the while completely unaware of the pain I was creating by my behaviors. I'm a true believer that people are always doing their best. Well, I guess I could say almost all people all the time. I'm sure that there are some outliers, but I don't know that I've ever met someone who is trying to ruin their life and everyone else is around them on purpose. 

16:19 

Believing that people are really doing their best requires that I offer an awful lot of grace for human frailty. I've really gotten to work on my beliefs that even when people make what seemed to me to be pretty poor decisions, they really are doing the best they can with all the experience and the knowledge and the tools that they have. There is always a reason people lack the way they do. And any decisions we make in life that cause us the most difficulty are decisions made from pain. When I see someone turn to drugs or alcohol or porn or an affair, reminding myself that there is a lot of pain there, that they are searching desperately for anything that will take away the sting of that pain helps me to show up with more compassion and curiosity. I have a friend who works with parents of kids who have gone to wilderness, so drug rehabilitation or other kinds of rehabilitation, and she's been doing this for several years and through some of her own experiences recently she was like "oh it's never about the drugs. It's never about the drugs, it's always about the pain in the relationships and pain somewhere that's going on," and when the pain is severe enough our brains get pretty panicky to alleviate the pain and will suggest options that we would not normally consider. 

17:45 

So when we ask the question, "what was he thinking?" Maybe we can just answer that they weren't thinking much of anything except, "what can I do to feel better right now? What will take my brain off of this issue right now? How can I stop the pain right now?" When we begin to open up our minds to the ideas that many of our past decisions and other people's past decisions have often come from a place of pain and that many of our current decisions and other people's current decisions come from a place of pain, we can feel a lot more compassion. Our thoughts create our feelings. If we think that they must be in a lot of pain to respond that way, then it is much easier to create compassion in our filling line. And from that compassion, it is much easier to act in loving and kind ways. 

18:38 

I know that some of you are probably thinking that it may not be true. Maybe their decision doesn't come from a place of pain and they're just really a mean and ornery person, then what? And it's a fair question to be sure. What if it's not true? What if they really are being horrible on purpose? Here's what it comes down to for me. I don't have any control or any responsibility for how they show up for the decisions that they make. What I am responsible for is me. How I choose to behave in any given circumstance. How I choose to think and how I choose to feel. And I know that when I believe the thought that people are doing the best that they can, that they may be in a lot of pain and that's why they're acting in ways that I might question, that thought makes it easier for me to show up the way that I want to. Believing they are doing the best they can under their current circumstances opens my heart up to feel compassion and love, to feel concern and kindness. And then I am much more likely to be happy with my behaviors because all I have control over is how I show up. And this thought helps me to show up the way that I want to. 

19:51 

It may not be true, but for me it doesn't always come down to whether the thought I'm thinking is true or not. More so, I'm concerned with whether the thought I'm having moves me toward greater kindness and compassion, or toward being dismissive and unkind in some way. Remembering that most dysfunctional and hurtful behaviors are coming from a place of pain helps me to take a step back, feel compassion, and then act from that place of compassion. And this avoids a lot of the drama that can happen in life, and it just feels so much better. Choosing to act from this place is very empowering. People can act in a lot of ways that can be hurtful and thoughtless. Rather than attributing their questionable behavior to them being a rotten person, reminding ourselves that it's very likely that they are in pain and struggling can help us to not match hurtful behavior for hurtful behavior, but rather step in and address the pain. 

20:53 

To me, this is part of the admonition to "mourn with those that mourn and comfort those that stand in need of comfort." To stop engaging in "an eye for an eye" and rather "turn the other cheek" and "go the second mile" with those who need it. I'm sure you've heard the phrase that hurt people hurt people. In being compassionate to others' pain, we have an opportunity to apply salve to the wounds of the hurt people, to return kindness for anger, to help heal the brokenhearted. Jesus Christ was and still is the master at seeing the pain behind the behaviors. I believe this is why he is the epitome of charity, of pure love, and why he is so able to apply his Atonement so freely...because he doesn't just see the behaviors. He sees the heart and the pain within the heart. I truly believe that learning how to respond to the pain rather than the behaviors puts us more in alignment with Jesus Christ and helps us to grow up spiritually into a more mature believer of Christ. 

21:59 

And I also don't believe this happens overnight. It takes practice learning how to be more aware and practice learning how to manage our thoughts and remind ourselves that people are in pain. But with some determination, some prayer, and some managed thinking, we can show up for people in pain with a healthy dose of compassion and kindness, allowing them the space to feel and acknowledge their pain and not shame them for their behaviors. Change doesn't happen in a space of shame. Ours or anyone else's. Change happens in a space of compassion: compassion for ourselves and for others, and our compassion for everyone else, and their compassion for us. Learning to step into compassion for people's pain rather than judgment, resentment, and retaliation will bring us greater joy, fulfillment and peace in this life. And this is what growing up is all about learning to see beyond the behaviors and into the pain. 

23:01 

I love growing up. This middle-aged gig is pretty darn awesome. Alright, my friends, that is going to do it for me today. If you need some help working through this, coaching is a beautiful place to see it and to come to terms with it and to learn how to manage your thoughts around it. You can find me at tanyahale.com. You can go to "free consultation," I think button at the top and you can click there and you can sign up on my calendar for a time that works for you. Or I can help you step into a better version of yourself. This coaching thing is so amazing to me. I'm so grateful that it has impacted my life in such an amazing powerful way. And I'm so honored to be able to be a part of the journey of my clients who are also striving to step into this this better, more compassionate place. Okay, have an awesome awesome week my friends, and we are on the downhill to the end of the year and there's some great stuff coming up. If you are not on my "weekend win" email list, please go to my website. I think you can go to the "contact me" tab and scroll down just a bit, and there's a place where you can sign up for my "weekend win." I'm going to be sending out my end of year review again this year, and that is something that you do not want to miss it. If you spend an hour and a half doing that, it completely changes your viewpoint of how this last year went and helps you see so clearly what you want to start creating for this upcoming year. So that'll be going out in my "weekend win" in the next week or two, so get on my website tanyahale.com and get signed up for my "weekend win." Again, that's on the "contact me" tab and then you just scroll down a little bit and you'll be able to get on that. And life is good. Life is amazing. These tools help make it even more so. Wish you all the best this week and I'll see you next week. Bye. 

25:04 

Thank you so much for joining me today. If you would love to receive some weekend motivation be sure to sign up for my free "weekend win" Friday email: a short and quick message to help you have a better weekend and position yourself for a more productive week Go to tanyahale.com to sign up and learn more about life coaching and how it can help you get to your best self ever. See ya.