Whats a nice bully? Ahhh good question. It's usually someone who uses "helpful insights or encouraging things" to make people feel bad about what they are feeling. As a therapist we learn to listen and validate. Eventually once a client is ready we might encourage them to try and help with change or assign a positive meaning to a difficult circumstances. However, this is only done with time.
It is so important to sit in the mud with people sometimes but its also really hard! It makes us uncomfortable and we usually try to fix it. Often our attempts to help make us feel worst. It cuts off our grieving process or invalidates our negative feelings. Work on using the skill of validation! Validation is not agreement but its acknowledgement of the pain that the person is experiencing. I can say validating phrases like "I see that this is really painful for you." "I know this is difficult (
hurtful)." Validation helps people be heard, it helps them feel supported and seen.
Try this next time, try sitting in peoples pain with them instead of being a nice bully and trying to hurry up their painful process. See if it makes a difference in their response to you. #validate #feelings #traumatherapy #traumaeffects