#thus showing you care on a deeper level while not jumping into stuff until they're ready

[skrunksthatwunk]

i think ive figured out part of why i feel like im awful at comforting people. ive been told im good at it and i feel that way sometimes but it often feels like im absolutely deadpan dog shit with nothing to say and ive realized it's because these are two separate phenomena.

im good at talking about feelings ppl have, because that's easy to validate and understand and comfort through. there's details that i can analyze like a text and a sort of narrative i can hold onto. it gives me footholds to try and help someone with. i can see the path of emotions they're experiencing and walk them through it, almost, giving them a shoulder to lean on

but im bad at responding to "hey x bad thing just happened to me" because i don't know what to say other than "uhhhh yikes. damn that sucks um im sorry" because there's nothing emotional for me to work with. it's like a smooth cliffside, there's just nothing i can do but stare at it and go damn that sure is a big cliff. i know there's emotions in there below it but i can't quite reach them.

not that the latter way's a bad way to express problems/vent/etc bc i do that a lot as well. sometimes it's not the time/place to get raw about something, i get it. it's more an assessment of my skill levels with both ig