When I ask you to listen and you start giving me advice,
you have not done what I’ve asked.

When I ask you to listen to me and you begin to tell me why I shouldn’t
feel that way, you are trampling on my feelings.

When I ask you to listen to me and you feel you have to do something
to solve my problem, you have failed me, strange as that may seem.

Listen! All I asked was that you listen – just hear me. I’m not helpless.

Maybe discouraged and faltering, but not helpless.

When you do something for me that I can
and need to do for myself,
you contribute to my fear and weakness.

But when you accept as a simple fact that I do feel what I feel,
no matter how irrational, then I can quit trying to convince you
and get about the business of understanding what’s behind
this irrational feeling.

When that’s clear, the answers are obvious and I don’t need advice.

Irrational feelings make sense when we know what’s behind them.