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SoWhoCaresAnyway E48 Listening inwards as we listen outwards · SoWhoCaresAnyway

• 0:04
  Welcome to So Who Cares Anyway?, a fortnightly podcast exploring stories that shape care, community, and the systems we live in.
• 0:13
  I'm Ruth Germaine, and in each episode I'm joined by my guests, people from behind clinical doors to the North York Moors, whose experiences open a window into how we care for one another.
• 0:25
  Together, we explore care through creativity, connection, and the strengths we already hold.
• Because care isn't small, care isn't soft, care shapes the world.
• So who cares anyway? It's time to talk about it.
• 0:42
  Hi, it's Ruth here, and today is another solo reflection.
• 0:46
  And I want to talk about stories and what they do to us, and why stories don't automatically create learning.
• 0:55
  And this matters.
• 0:57
  In this podcast, I had said to me a number of times, we need to share stories about things that happen.
• Go out and talk to people, listen, and stories will build empathy.
• But a recent conversation made me realize that it's a bit more complicated than just sharing stories.
• So this particular story was of a parent-carer of a young, um, autistic person, a young adult.
• And that particular person had had co-occurring mental health needs that went along with that, and years of crisis, inconsistency in the care and the support that they received, and that inconsistency had caused harm.
• And as I listened to this conversation and this story from this lady, I could feel the emotional weight that she had held for years.
• She'd worked in NHS governance, so she understood the system.
• So she decided that what she would do is she would s- share her story At a training event to help people learn.
• 2:07
  And she didn't quite get the response that she expected.
• 2:12
  The responses that she got from her story was, "That's awful.
• 2:16
  We wouldn't do that.
• 2:17
  No, that's not me.
• That's not us.
• 2:20
  That's not something we would do."
• So this lady had described a moment where her daughter's communication, her non-verbal communication, was misunderstood.
• A smile was seen as, "I'm not really...
• 2:36
  I'm okay, and I'm not really too worried about this."
• 2:41
  And assumptions were made about that smile and what it meant.
• But of course, when somebody's an autistic person, their non-verbal communication may be different.
• 2:52
  There were also comments made that I would say were inappropriate.
• Listening to the lady, I just was, felt in shock and flabbergasted as to what, um, a person had said to her when, um, she had been with her daughter to seek help.
• And those comments understandably caused distress and changed the whole dynamic and the support and care that her daughter received These were clear examples of misunderstanding, making assumptions, and saying things because they were believed to be right and true.
• 3:29
  They weren't subtle.
• 3:31
  So the lady I was speaking to told me about how she'd shared this story, hoping that this would help people to learn and understand, but nothing changed.
• 3:43
  As I said, people just suddenly went and started to create their own story and say, "No, that's not me.
• I wouldn't do that.
• We wouldn't do that.
• 3:51
  That's not how we work."
• 3:54
  So this is where I started to think, well, what do stories actually do? If stories are so important, and we can learn from stories, what do they do? And I always think in reflection, the first thing that we are asked to do, so anybody who knows any reflective models, it will say to you, "How did that make you feel?" So yeah, stories evoke shock, sadness, empathy, defensiveness, guilt, overwhelm, shame, all sorts of things can come from those stories.
• And emotions are normal.
• 4:29
  We all have emotions.
• Of course, we're gonna have an emotional response, but the emotion isn't learning, and learning in itself isn't change.
• 4:41
  And if we're not careful, shame and guilt and overwhelm can actually start to create or cause us to start to create our own protective narratives like, "I wouldn't do that.
• No, it's not like that where I work," or, "We're already doing our best.
• We're trying."
• And I know because I've started to create those narratives myself sometimes when I hear a story.
• It's automatic.
• When we have an emotion, we start to create our own story, and then suddenly we have the story that's been shared and the story that we're creating.
• Of course, those things might actually be true.
• I like to think that I wouldn't have said the things that that person said to the lady's daughter that time.
• I'm pretty sure that I wouldn't.
• But I still know that I've worked in environments where that might have happened.
• So when it comes to learning, what's the missing ingredient when we have a story being shared, something that's real that might create emotions in us? To learn, we need to feel safe.
• 5:51
  To listen deeply, we need to feel safe.
• 5:55
  To stay open and curious and to think, we need to feel safe.
• And all of those things require trust.
• Safety allows us to stay present.
• It helps us to tolerate discomfort.
• And by doing that, we can hear what's actually being said.
• 6:17
  And rather than react and start to create our own story, we can stop and reflect and ask, "Hmm, well, what does that mean for me?" Without safety, stories become something that we survive rather than something that we learn from In workforce development, so often people learn in classrooms, and it doesn't feel safe when we come back to change practice.
• 6:45
  I've seen this in workforce development when I've been setting up or, um, study days and events, and people come back again, and they don't apply it in practice.
• But that's because there needs to be a safety between our learning and our knowledge to shape behavior So learning only becomes practice when people feel safe, connected.
• 7:12
  I would even say that learning is social.
• 7:15
  We need to feel socially included when people feel honest and when people are able to tolerate uncertainty A lot of the work I've been doing around the learning disability and autism community practice that I'm setting up at the moment, um, the reading that I've done and the conversations I've had, of which this is one, have said that there are...
• 7:41
  say that we need to think about how are we going to use things and how are we going to, um, use the information and learning that we get.
• 7:51
  So I came to two questions that I thought might be useful.
• 7:55
  I'm not saying they're the right questions or the only questions, but they seem to be working so far as we're developing the community of practice.
• When we're listening to something, hearing something new, hearing something that's perhaps triggering an emotion in us, stop Don't make up our own story, and ask these two things.
• 8:19
  The first thing is, what one thing might have made a difference? That allows us to think about it without having to say, "I did or didn't do this.
• I would or wouldn't do this."
• 8:34
  And the second thing is, what one thing might I or my team, or the place where I work, the place where I learn, do differently? These questions require honesty, humility, and responsibility, and for us to be open.
• 8:55
  They only work when people feel safe, but actually in themselves, because they aren't asking us to interpret and say whether or not this is something we might do or something that we have been involved in or might happen, don't require us, our minds, to start to develop its own s- story in order to feel safe.
• 9:16
  Those questions actually start to create that safety that we need.
• So without safety, people might default to, "That's awful.
• We wouldn't do that, and it's not like that around here."
• 9:32
  It matters.
• 9:32
  Stories alone don't create change stories, however, are incredibly important.
• 9:41
  Awareness alone doesn't create change.
• 9:43
  Being aware and hearing the stories, we have to do something else.
• 9:48
  Safety creates the conditions for change.
• 9:51
  Safety requires trust.
• 9:53
  When people trust, when people feel safe, they can stop.
• 9:56
  They can stay with a story.
• 9:58
  They can feel the emotion without shutting down.
• 10:02
  They can reflect on their own practice and ask, "What might I do differently? How can I act differently?" It's certainly something that I'm gonna do as I start to listen to stories in the future.
• So next time you hear a powerful story, stop.
• Notice how it makes you feel.
• 10:25
  We all have feelings and emotions.
• 10:28
  It's normal.
• It's fine.
• If you notice any sense of defensiveness or overwhelm, just pause And then whatever the emotion, just ask what one thing might have made a difference? And what one thing might I or my team do differently? It gives us something practical.
• It gives us something to help us feel safe, and it gives us something to help turn stories into something that will create change, develop our own empathy, and help us think about the response that we might have.
• 11:09
  So thank you for listening, and until next time.
• I hope today's conversation gave you something to think about.
• If it did, please share it with someone.
• 11:20
  Ripples matter.
• 11:22
  You can also follow the show so you don't miss future episodes.
• 11:25
  And if you have reflections or ideas, then please leave a rating.
• Or to support my work, head over to my Linktree, which you can find in the show notes.
• 11:34
  But for now, stay caring, stay connected, stay curious.
• Thanks for listening