Sometimes, It Can Be About You

This is a companion piece to yesterday's post, It's Not Always About You.

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I wrote a long time ago about my grandmother's plush goose. As mentioned previously, as a small girl I tried to deploy the presence of the goose as an outward sign that I had emotions that might need tending. While I was unsuccessful in implementing this strategy for making the invisible, visible, I think it was nevertheless a very solid idea: imagine how much simpler life would be if people had a visible indication of the presence of an emotional need.

Unfortunately, people do not, so we are left to guess when others might need supportive care of their feelings. I'm not particularly adept at determining what feelings other people are experiencing, as we know -- but regardless of whether I can tell what's happening, I take emotions very seriously. It's extremely important to me that when other people are speaking to me about their Feelings, or visibly having Feelings in my presence, that I acknowledge them and respect them. Your Feelings are valid. And you are valid. 

This is one of the reasons why I absolutely loathe practical jokes: making someone else feel foolish or embarrassed, making them believe something that isn't true to trick them, or scaring them so that other people may laugh, is reprehensible to me.  No. We don't do that. Ever. No.

There is a kind of Prime Directive, in my world: respect the Feelings of others. 

If someone shares Feelings with me in confidence, I will protect those Feelings forever. Showing a moment of vulnerability? I'll safeguard that moment with my life; no one else will ever see it, unless you choose to share it with them. Need to unburden a secret? I'll carry it with you, whenever you need. You are safe with me. Your Feelings are safe with me. 

I am not here to judge you for what emotions you are experiencing. I'm here in the hopes that you may feel understood. And, if you need, to experience those emotions with you. Because sometimes it's only safe to have Feelings, when someone is there, too. 

Goose, now on a shelf along with koalas, puppet pigs, 

a wombat, a fuzzy green dragonfly, and at last,

all of Grandma's chickens.