She was asking someone on my team a question when I sidled up to her and waited for her to finish her query. As she turned, I simply put my arms around her.
"Hi Nadia," I said quietly, "I think you need a hug right now."
And she just started crying. There in my arms, she held on and sobbed.
I think it's because I know what it's like to hold in so much pain, and contain all the grief in a very tight vessel that you think you've buried deep inside that I am able to sense it so acutely and tangibly in others.
I recall recently talking to someone very important to me and we were discussing our lives, and also that thing about being empaths. I recall pondering the idea that I sometimes tell myself that I am able to absorb all the pain that is out there in the world and perhaps help mitigate the anguish and despair that is out there, if perhaps somehow, even a little bit, it makes the world we live in a better place.
I don't know. Maybe it's a way of surviving for me. I've done my share of locking out people and pushing away those who care simply from a deeply entrenched emotional claustrophobia that maybe everything that comes my way is just a way of me getting my share.
Then again, just the way I spotted Nadia throughout the day chatting with colleagues, making jokes, cackling to her own surprise, I can smile to myself to know that perhaps just by my own small gestures I can provide comfort to others and help lighten the loads they are carrying just by acknowledging that I care.
There'll always be the people who will make sure you know that they care, not by assuming you know, but by their behaviour. It's also ok to let go of the naive idea that you can ever be so important to be someone's #1. Be your own #1.
