I recently had the pleasure of sitting down with Kyle and Sara Wester on The Art of Raising Humans Podcast to talk about anxiety and the importance that empathy plays in meeting children where they are—the first step in helping kids navigate their emotions.
When our kids have reactions to events that we wish they didn’t— we often get into “fix it mode” and try to convince them (with the best of intentions) that their reactions aren’t logical or there is another way to look at the situation. For example, when a child is overwhelmed by homework totally shuts down, or a teen who wasn’t inviting to a social gathering turning their disappointment and rejection against themselves with a global assessment—no one likes me, I’m such a loser. We feel their pain so acutely and we want to help them pivot elsewhere asap. The thing is, if we—compassionately– want our kids to pivot to our way of understanding the situation, we need to pivot first to where they are: See the situation through their eyes: “This feels like too much. It feels like this is impossible.” Or, “This meant so much to you to not be invited—it feels like nothing can work now.” Once we pivot to where our kids are we get what I call the “nodding head of agreement.” They nod in agreement with our compassionate description of where they’ve landed. Our kids feel understood—and they begin to understand themselves. They don’t have to prove to us how bad they feel, we see it and we’ve named it with them. Taking this step, which may feel indirect or like a detour, actually builds trust and your child is more likely to follow your lead to where you go next, because you have joined them exactly where they are on their map.
Then you can begin to unpack and add context and perspective to their quick amygdala-driven conclusions: “I understand how it can feel that way. Can we fact check that? Is that what you would tell a friend? What’s the hardest part of this? If it felt easier, what would be different? Would it be a change in how you’re talking about it? Would it be a different take on the narrative? Or, would it be something different that you would do?”
This maneuver of the heart which takes a few more minutes on the front end is a time saver, a shortcut in the long run, and helps kids feel better faster. Plus—your compassionate voice becomes the one they internalize—instead of being self-critical, “what is wrong with me?!?” they are learning from your example: “this feels bad right now and that’s OK.” This works for adults—and even pets too : ) more about that another time.
A while back I wrote a piece (courtesy of some “coaching” from our older daughter) about how to truly join and empathize without giving the “to do” list (why don’t you just…, you should just… ). I need to reread it from time to time!! And I will! For now, as I continue to work on lifelong project of finding the empathy path, I hope you’ll give a listen here to my conversation with Kyle and Sara. Here’s to more understanding, and, as always, here’s less worry all around.
©2025 Tamar Chansky, Ph.D.
