Let us test and examine our ways and return to the Lord.
Lamentations 3:40
I recently changed the hospital where I serve as chaplain; I used to work at Adventist Health Glendale for nearly two years, but recently moved to Good Samaritan Hospital in Downtown Los Angeles. Within the first week of working there, I already felt the significant difference in two demographic. I find myself utilizing my Spanish and Korean languages a lot more often and I’m also dealing with a lot more underprivileged and homeless patients. To say the past two months have been emotionally challenging is an understatement. But when a patient is expressing a struggle, difficult emotion, or ambivalent experience, it is my responsibility as a chaplain to befriend them and help them process whatever they need. However, there have been times when patients share something so close to home that it’s difficult for me to stay in the room with them; because whatever they’re sharing made me too sad, upset, or anxious. But I found myself asking, “If I can be gracious and patient enough to sit with them in their emotions, why can’t I show myself the same grace and patience to sit with mine?” This is how I’ve been practicing the art of “befriending my emotions.” Instead of ignoring, avoiding, or suppressing heavy emotions, I’ve been sitting with them and welcoming their presence in their lives. To my surprise, the moment I acknowledge and sit with my emotions, the sooner it passes through me.
“All of our emotions… need to be understood and respected, perhaps even befriended. We need to pull up a chair and sit with them, understand why they’re showing up, and ask ourselves what there is to learn.”
–Brené Brown, Atlas of the Heart
