Now, you will become acquainted with something that will surely develop your empathy and may prove very helpful in keeping some troubles at bay.
What is it?
It’s about the ability to see the world through the eyes of someone else.
Now, evoke memories of a situation in which you and someone else took part (i.e. a discussion during which you disagree). The pictures you see are most likely to be identical with the one you saw then. It will be so-called:
We talk about first position when you see situations from your own perspective. At that time you are in association.
And now, let’s make a small experiment – think about the same situation but as if you could see it through the eyes of the other person.
See yourself in the picture. How do you behave? How do you react? What else does your interlocutor see?
As you may guess, when you look at the world through other people’s eyes it is the
Pay attention to how your attitude toward this situation has changed.
Do your best to feel as if you were in someone else’s shoes.
How does he see this situation? Is it now easier for you to understand his point of view and his arguments?
Remember, that if you want to understand the other person, you have to meet him in his Map of World. Think how this change of viewpoint will help you to reach this map.
Are this person’s positive intentions more comprehensible now?
You undoubtedly happened to hear: well, try to look through with my eyes...
Sometimes we say that, but do we make a step further to really imagine how it looks like from a different perspective?
It is so simple and may be very helpful.
Another phrase: Look at it from the distance is also very often used by us
So, do it now. Change your point of view, become a detached observer.
You should be able to see and hear yourself and the other person from one side, from the back and from the front, from above, from a short and long distance...
Pay attention to how your attitude toward this situation has changed. Do you perceive it in a different way?
Perhaps, your emotions have weakened and you keep the distance from this situation. When you are in the second or the third position, in other words when you see yourself either through the eyes of someone else or as an indefinite observer, we say that you are in dissociation.
Now you can “re-associate” to the initial position, gauge the reaction, and return by dissociation to the chosen position. Make experiments with different situations and pay attention when your attitude toward the situation changes most. Do you find it easier to understand other’s point of view? Or perhaps hardly anything has changed. If it’s like that you will soon become acquainted with new methods of working on yourself and on pictures in your mind.
Also pay attention to the way a language reveals unconsciously what people do to understand others or to solve problems.
We are uppermost in that we use these tools consciously and thanks to this they are much more effective.