麻豆传媒

After one of my recent book talks, an audience member described a friend who was having a hard time. Every conversation turned to the stress the friend was experiencing at work or the marital problems she was facing at home. 鈥淚 want to be there for her,鈥� my new acquaintance told me. 鈥淏ut I don鈥檛 seem to be helping.鈥�

Offering emotional support should, of course, be central to any good relationship 鈥� and until recently, I thought that patient listening was the best help that someone could offer. This is a very common opinion that draws on a . Put simply, we assume negative emotions can build up like hot gas in an engine. If we don鈥檛 let them escape, we will explode 鈥� or at least suffer psychological damage from the stress. By encouraging others to talk about their unhappiness, we can open that valve, allowing them to 鈥渓et off steam鈥� and release the pain.

There鈥檚 a lot of sense in this. Self-expression can sometimes feel cathartic, and it is important to feel validated for the pain that we are experiencing. , however, suggests that it has its limits. If we let someone vent for too long, we may only be encouraging rumination, which will ultimately amplify their stress. For this reason, we might also help them to consider their problems from a broader perspective 鈥� a process known as reconstrual.

, a psychologist at the University of Michigan, writes about this in his book Chatter. In one experiment, he and his team recruited more than 200 students who were in the midst of a personal conflict. Over instant messaging, some of the participants were asked to recount the upsetting situation in some detail. The rest were asked to look at the situation through a wider lens, through questions such as: 鈥淟ooking at the situation, could you tell me why this event was stressful to you?鈥�; 鈥淗ave you learned anything from this experience, and if so, would you mind sharing it with me?鈥�; and 鈥淚n the grand scheme of things, if you look at the 鈥榖ig picture鈥�, does that help you make sense of this experience? Why or why not?鈥�

As Kross and his colleagues had hypothesised, these prompts encouraged the participants to look beyond their immediate pain. They felt a little distanced from the event, which reduced the stress they were feeling while producing a greater sense of closure.

Needless to say, we should practise this with sensitivity and respect. If someone鈥檚 feelings are too raw, there will be little we can do to help them gain perspective. But in many cases, we may find that a small nudge towards reconstrual does wonders for their mood, and may even help them to find a long-term solution to their difficulties 鈥� while giving our own ears a rest from the endless negativity.

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