Do you ever feel inadequate or unsure of how to respond when someone lets you know they are struggling?

These ten messages can help you. You can communicate these messages overtly or just through your presence. If you consistently respond these messages, you will notice that people soften, relax, tell you more about their situation, and feel grateful to have someone who really “gets them.”

1. Listen with a soft and open heart.
2. Tell the truth with love, kindness, and gratitude. Say whatever is known and say it slowly, directly, and from your heart. Communicate the truth through your example—your behavior speaks louder than any words. Be ready to be ignored, heard, blasted, and/or appreciated; any response is possible. Repeat your message often, always expressing love and appreciation toward the person. Here are two videos showing examples of telling the truth with love when people are struggling with serious illness or dying:
   • 4 minutes: http://youtu.be/0gUOP9IvZew
   • 12 minutes: http://youtu.be/CrH0k0lAesE
3. Bring in joy, laughter, play, food, music, flowers, sunlight, gratitude, hugs, and other forms of loving touch as often as you can. Here’s one example in this six-minute home video of a mother and her two daughters. This video, filmed by her husband, demonstrates a family doing all of the most important things. http://youtu.be/slSgrRlPQww
4. Be ready for moods to switch rapidly, and let them. Emotions are like water— they need to flow—and they tend to run downhill in a zigzag way before they reach the spacious sea. Anger and control are often masks for the deeper emotions of fear and sadness. If possible, do not let yourself be caught up in this disguise. Instead, hold safe and sacred space for the person’s deeper emotions to emerge. Sadness, joy . . . health, illness . . . death, birth . . . beauty, horror . . . these exist together and are felt together—they aren’t separate things as our popular media often conveys; and we often feel disoriented by them. It’s not always possible for people to reach peace in their lifetime. We can still support them on that journey and celebrate each step of progress they make, no matter how small—meanwhile working with our own peace and letting it be a light.
5. Set healthy boundaries that honor your needs and the needs of anyone you're caring for. Defining your boundaries helps you know how you will and won’t allow yourself to be treated by others. Your boundaries are defined by your feelings. Your feelings will always tell you whether a boundary of yours has been crossed, no matter what kind of boundary it is.
6. Let the person know that you “get” what they are expressing. It’s terrible to have symptoms you do not like. It’s much worse to feel like no one really understands or cares. The more the person can see that you understand not just the underlying causes of their situation but the actual experience of what it’s like to be going through it, the more they will trust you. If you don't authentically understand what the person is saying, then be curious and gently ask questions or quietly contemplate the situation to learn more, because this isn’t something you can just “say.” You’ve got to embody that you understand so it shows in all the ways you interact with the person. How do you do this if you haven’t had the experience the person is having?

• • Caring is the most important ingredient. You certainly care, or you wouldn’t be reading this. Value yourself and your caring, and let yourself feel confident in your caring. Your caring will radiate from you, and anyone who’s paying attention will see and feel it.
  • Ask yourself how it might feel to be this person and to be experiencing what they are experiencing. Your understanding will come from listening, watching, and opening your sensitivity to feel in rapport with the person.

7. Let the person know that they are not crazy. After you let the person know that you “get it,” then communicate the message that you think that lots of other people who are in a similar situation are probably feeling something similar. It’s disorienting to be dying, because they are losing everything they’ve identified with. It’s a powerful thing when they can realize that their responses are totally natural; it helps them feel they are not crazy.

8. Let the person know that they are not alone. This is connected to #7 with a twist. Knowing that their responses are normal (because other people have them, too) helps the person feel that they are not alone, on a certain level. Even more powerful is when the person feels that you are being fully present with them, as evidenced by your fully hearing them and seeing what they are going through. This can only be done after you’ve focused on THEM and you’ve released your internal agenda.

9. Show the person that there is hope. When a person is struggling or afraid, it can be very easy to obsess about the worst case scenarios. In those cases, it’s normal to feel hopeless about a situation just from one’s limited experience with it. If you can help the person focus on the tangible things in the room, in the moment, and that nothing damaging is happening right now, that will help them greatly. Then you can draw them a map showing them how they might get from their current concerns to what they want to experience instead. The caveat is to be very honest about the possibilities and limitations that you see in their situation. Because if you give them hope and it’s not at all realistic, they will be less likely to trust someone offering to help them again. You can convey to the person a message that "Some things can be different than they are now, even if you can not see how yet. Let’s look at how you might get there.” Hope is vital for people to hear, see and feel.

10. If the above approaches do not help, then show the person a bigger context. When someone can see that there is meaning in their suffering and that their symptoms, however uncomfortable, might just be the best thing to ever happen, that their situation didn’t happen to them but for them, and that it’s a part of their soul’s journey, then you will see many people take a deep breath and be willing to face something that would have daunted them before. One time I was working with a man who was dying and was continually anxious about almost everything. No amount of listening, or any of the other things on this list, were helping him relax. Finally one day, as I was listening to him with a soft and open heart, it occurred to me to tell him, “Max, death is safe.” That simple truth opened something inside his heart and he breathed it in. After that, he stopped struggling, and we often heard him remind us (and himself) that death is safe.

Can you think of other messages people need to hear when they are struggling?

3 Exercises to Practice Your Caregiving

If you still feel inadequate when talking with someone who is struggling, I recommend you try these exercises:

• Visualize yourself in conversation with the person, actively listening to them and being a healing presence.
• Talk out loud in front of a mirror, as if you were talking with the person, and notice where your voice gets tense or rough.
• Ask yourself what’s at the root of your discomfort. When you find the gift or lesson there, release the emotions or energetics of that root with your breath and honor the lesson with a simple ceremony. This can be as simple as lighting a candle, ringing a bell or dancing to express and honor what you have learned.

Next Steps for Holistic Nurses & Caregivers

If you enjoyed this post, check out our CE Course "Learn to Be a Healing Presence" or our "Become and Enlightened Caregiver" bundle.