As each of us mature in our God-given gifts, we become more insightful about the strengths and weaknesses of this gift designed with us. In this understanding of how this gift ticks/works, negativity and confusion are replaced with hope and faith. This insight has the ability to make us not only more comfortable in our soul skin but insight into how to temper, reign in and release this gift.
I have been on mom-quest for quite a few years to find the answer to the question: How do you persuade a compassion/mercy spiritual-gifted person to do anything? (see When Talking Suffocates)
I am so excited about today. Brandee from Smooth Stones is guest-hosting – my very first guest host. As I read her post, Love Wins, I thought, “This is how my son feels.” This was the compassion gift talking to me. After I read that, I messaged her, asking “How do you persuade a compassion gift person to do anything” – what is the best way to encourage them. . . .I want to know how to be the parent he needs.”
Who better knows the answer to this question that a compassion gifted person who has learned how to use that gift? She has graciously opened her heart and insight to us today:
When Logic Loses, Love Goes Straight to the Heart
So you long for effective interaction with someone who has the gift of compassion or (as I like to refer to it) mercy. Perhaps you’re feeling overwhelmed by the drama of it, the roller-coaster of it, or even this other person’s anger. You want nothing more than to guide, help, motivate, or otherwise make a positive difference in this person’s life, but you’re at a loss. How can you grow—or even just maintain/preserve—your relationship with this sensitive other?
Maryleigh perceived correctly that my spiritual gift is mercy and asked me to speak to being parented effectively, given my gift, which led to my compiling the following list of key thoughts. I hope you’ll find it useful regardless of the nature of your relationship with a mercy-gifted person. Before you read the list, take a deep breath and know: you’re to be commended for both recognizing someone else’s spiritual gift and caring enough to seek ways to improve your relationship with this person. God has almost certainly placed you in this person’s life for a reason.
- Realize: your approach is critical; you must pass through her* feelings to get to her thoughts. If you’re careless with her feelings—especially by patronizing, judging, or labeling—she’ll shut down, which is to say: she’ll get stuck over your approach and fail to receive even your best advice.
- Always remember: with her, you’ll get further with love than with logic.
- Postpone a hard conversation until you’re in control of your emotions. Again, she’s sensitive to approach; unless you’re legitimately calm (not just “fake calm”), you’re not going to get the response you want.
- If you’re in control of your emotions but she can’t seem to control hers, acknowledge her feelings, reassure her of your love, and suggest postponing the conversation until a set date and time in the future. If she wants to continue in conversation, you might try unless she’s being verbally abusive in some way but realize: it’s important for her to learn that conversation is most productive when everyone’s in control of his or her emotions.
- Prove to her over time: you’re trustworthy. You’ll never force her to work through her feelings alone. Even if you must postpone a conversation, you’ll never leave her holding the bag for long, let alone forever.
- If you have a good handle on your approach, try to help her see the big picture. She can easily lose perspective, overlooking her long, positive history with a loved one (or even the Lord!) in the face of the present difficulty, and things can become “gloom and doom” in her mind all too easily. If you can somehow teach her (through words and/or example) to take a step back when her emotions threaten to consume, you’ll deeply bless her life. I was in my mid-twenties before I gained enough control to stop hyperventilating and vomiting when especially upset.
- Realize: anger is almost never her (or anyone’s) real emotion. Try to determine and respond to the source of the hurt beneath the anger. If you can see through both anger and hurt to the fear at the core and respond to the fear, all the better.
- Take comfort in the fact that—if she’s being particularly unkind—she’s very likely to experience remorse and offer an apology after calming down. She knows what it’s like to have hurt feelings and doesn’t like to cause them in other people.
- Try to imagine living life with your heart on your sleeve or your nerve endings exposed and know: that’s her reality. Her feelings are more real to her than her thoughts. Never invalidate them, no matter how ridiculous they seem. Look her in the eye. Let her know you’re hearing her. Magic words (but only if they’re true): “I love you and always will, no matter what. I’m so sorry you’re hurting. I’m here for you.”
- Know: it’s better to say nothing than to say something insincere or untrue. She can detect insincerity and lies in a heartbeat.
- Try loosening the reins: she’s probably more trustworthy than you think.
- In as much as possible, give her space and time to process information, make decisions, and even fulfill tasks. She’s probably more innately responsible than you think, especially on her own timetable.
- Help her find a local mentor with the gift of mercy. If she doesn’t seem to come alive under this person’s wings, it’s the wrong fit. Ask the Lord to provide a mentor and choose him or her with care; some people (even within the church!) never learn how to use the gift of mercy responsibly. The more your person can learn about and experience caring for others in a safe environment, in safe ways, the better. Ideally, the local mentor will apply his or her gift in the name of Jesus (as opposed to only in the name of a specific hospital, school, etc.). I recommend that—with a responsible mentor—your person delve specifically into the areas of pastoral care and prayer. In these realms, she’ll have the opportunity to respond to many types of people and situations and may therefore be able to better determine how she’s innately gifted to serve. (For example, even as a teenager, I worked more effectively with adults than with children.)
- Note: an important part of your person’s education will involve discernment. Encourage her to see herself as a steward of her gift of mercy: as having responsibility for how, when, where, why and for/with whom she uses it. Encourage her to seek God’s face before acting so as not to fall prey to those who would take advantage of her kind heart. Again, I can’t recommend enough that she work with a responsible mentor; until she has a solid grasp of her gift, her spirit could easily be crushed (whether intentionally or unintentionally) by someone in need of mercy.
*I do realize that your person may be male. I’ve chosen to refer to your person with female pronouns (her, she, etc.) for the sake of simplicity, also because I’m female and these are things I wish people to know about interacting with me.
Brandee Shafer is an English instructor turned SAHM to the 4 children for whom she records her life and thoughts, through blogging. She, her husband Jim, and their children live in a log cabin on the outskirts of Richmond, Virginia, where she writes, teaches “homeschool preschool,” and tries, daily, to diminish toppling piles of dishes and laundry.
Thanks for the tips and for linking up with Wedded Wednesday! 🙂
Thank you, Maryleigh, for welcoming me into your space! Can’t wait to hug your neck in person!
Brandee – I am so glad you came. I know there are a lot of moms out there who have the same compassion/mercy gift children – and who are like me – talking them to death thinking we’re loving them – and I want them to feel empowered early on as their children develop and grow. Wishing I had known this sooner – but God knows the why of the timing:) In the process of writing the lead-up post – God also revealed that those with the mercy-gift are real risk-takers – the first-responders in a way – and that opened my eyes to the nobleness of this gift that is so often over-looked!
Yeah, you know, I thought that point so interesting and true. I’m good for a meal or a hospital visit, and my favorite thing in all the world (my one true calling, perhaps) is to help write a funeral. BUT you nailed it: I don’t stick around for long unless it’s, like, someone very close to me.
This was so interesting. I’m thinking you, (Brandee), and my husband are a lot alike.!
That makes me happy, to be honest, because you always write him down as such a good man.
Brandee! So good to see you over here, my friend!
Thank you, for the helpful tips…I have more than one person in my life for whom these words will be helpful…
Even more, thank you for sharing your heart!
Have a very blessed day!
Thank you, Joe. So much love to you.
This gives me some insight into my husband who is very emotional and has a good dose of the gift of compassion. I appreciate how you’ve addressed this, Brandee, given that you have first-hand experience with the challenges of being gifted in this way. It’s helpful to me to see that this “sensitivity” is part of the gift of compassion and is not flaw or dysfunction–which in the heat of the moment, it seems like it is! I’m going to keep this list as a helpful resource when I’m dealing with my hubby or others who have this gifting. Thanks also to Maryleigh for hosting you today! Interesting topic!
Thank you for this kind comment. I think Maryleigh and I would agree that there’s a dark side to every gifting, as well as to every love language. Re the latter, one of my children is very obviously “physical touch,” and I’m not going to lie: it makes me nervous b/c that’s my love language, and until my (second) husband made physical touch holy for me, I allowed my physical desires to come between the Lord and me for…pretty much my entire, adult life. I think so much of who we are needs to be channeled constructively, and that’s what makes these conversations [that Maryleigh is trying to spark] so very important. Look, I was well into my 30’s before I even KNEW what my spiritual gift and love language ARE. Cracked my world open like a little nut. Helped me to forgive myself, also to cast myself under the leadership of those who could help me learn to put my spiritual gift to good use. Helps me, still, to cling physically to the man the Lord has given me. I won’t claim I’m free of dysfunction, but I do think some of my struggles are tied to how the Lord made me and not just a big heap of crazy. 🙂
some solid wisdom in this brandee….
in how we deal with and approach other…and particularly of this gifting…understanding the person, taking the time to understand them is huge…and will def help you find your way through it together.
Thank you, Brian, for your constant encouragement. What an important and inspirational bloggy friend you are to me.
This is so good. I want to know you more, Brandee. I am a mercy-heart person, too…can be hard even if a blessing…thanks for this.
How sweet! I’m a little harder to know than I used to be because I quit facebook. I’m still shocked that I did it, but I’m. so. much. happier! You’re welcome in my corner of the blogosphere anytime, and my e-mail is normalgirl@hotmail.com
Deep, deep here today. Even for those of us who might have a different gifting. Thank you for many thoughts, much wise counsel …
Thank you for these encouraging words. I appreciate Maryleigh’s giving me the opportunity to share.
Hopped over on the faith jam, and boy am I glad I did! A mercy person myself, I have sometimes struggled with my daughter’s mercy heart. Your words put things back in perspective. Thank you. Acknowledging emotions, and then I tell her, “you have a choice,” and she thinks and inevitably clears up. But quite often the gloom and doom time just needs a hug, the words spoken going to extremes are checked and at the end apologized for when perspective returns. It’s hard being in middle school when emotions range all over the place! Anyway, thanks for these tips, and Blue Cotton Memory, thanks for loving your son. (Maybe he’d like A Solitary Blue by Cynthia Voigt? Read it yourself first?)
Thanks Beth for adding your voice to this discussion. I will definitely look into A Solitary Blue – and then pass it on to him. It does seem they have to spill their emotions out and in the spilling are able to filter through and pull perspective out of it. Giving them time to sort through, sometimes with just quiet company – I’m learning to be quiet company.
What a great comment. Middle school. *shudder* I remember. I stabbed a boy with a pencil when I was in middle school; I told him to leave me alone or I’d stab him, and he kept at it, so I stabbed him. Scary to have so little control.
I think you set up some healthy boundaries in that situatiaon Brandee – you didn’t just do it.You defended yourself. Keep in mind that heros come from two places – those who have to learn to fight (literally and figuratively) and those who have to learn to the self-control to fight at the right times. Both are hard places to come from.
Ha! You’re too sweet to me, M. I’m thinking I should’ve just hollered for a teacher.
Awesome Brandee!! And thanks for having her Maryleigh! Your tips are so on point! Being a pastor’s wife, we’ve had many counseling sessions that could have turned sour, based on our presentation. It’s so true that we as ministers/teachers know our audience and seek God for discernment on how to effectively communicate and minister to them so that the only thing they’ll get from us is an encouraging word seasoned with the love of Christ! Thanks again for sharing and thanks Maryleigh for linking up…blessings to you both!
Every blessing to you as you counsel and minister!
“could have turned sour, IF our presentation was wrong”
what a mother you are
listening to the best advice
His!!
because we’re all seeing though that glass darkly 🙂
Well hello, Miss Brandee! What fun, finding you over here 🙂
Much of this spoke to me because I spent a great many years trying to parent a child who was gifted and wired so completely different than me. I’ve learned the hard way, much of the truth of what you’ve written here. If only Scripture had said something to me like, “Be quick to listen, slow to speak, slow to anger . . . ” Or something like that.
Oh wait. If only I’d been paying better attention, I guess. You are so very right about anger, though. Rarely is it the core issue. i heard a line in a movie once, something to the effect that anger is just fear working it’s way out. It helps me to remember that.
You are one wise momma. Always a gift, reading your words. Hugs.
That movie quote speaks to me, Nancy, and makes me want to grab up my man: seems like we’re both struggling with anger above all the other emotions, lately, and I do think we’re very often afraid (sometimes for solid reasons, sometimes not). Love you. Saw today that your Patrick turned or is turning one: happiest of birthdays to him. He’s three months behind my little Chip of a yumster!
You are so right about “anger is just fear working it’s way out” – I think it sometimes it is anger, sometimes it is just the frustration of growing into independence – and the recognizition they don’t know it all – and that is overwhelming! I work my fear out with words – maybe each gift works its way out differently. Thank you, Nancy – you’ve given me something to think about here!
Oh – so much of this I relate to. (Mercy and exhortation are my spiritual gifts.) I may be forwarding it to some people on how to deal with ME. 🙂
I’m not at all surprised; we’re totally soul sisters.