Helping her husband to better understand his wife's unprovoked rage--and her problems in regulating her emotions generally--proved invaluable. As a result of his far more sympathetic understanding of his wife's self-protective "anger buttons"--as well as his newfound resolve to be a healing influence in her life--he eventually decided to return to the marriage. In the course of my work with them, the husband learned not to react so personally to his wife's flare-ups (which in the past had only led her to become more upset). And in being better able to understand just what his wife's wrath was in reaction to--namely, her primal fears of abandonment--he became increasingly adept at soothing both her and himself; and by so doing, helped her to re-connect with her more balanced and rational, adult self.
His wife, too, in gradually being able to comprehend how her emotions could abruptly take hold of her, began to develop skills to perceive present-day situations more accurately, and thus more comfortably begin to reveal to her husband her vulnerable side--rather than her knee-jerk angry reactions, which, though they helped safeguard her from distressing feelings of danger, kept pushing him away (to the point that he had originally decided, though he still cared for her, to leave the relationship). On her part, the wife was better able to understand and accept why, over the course of their marriage, her husband had determined to tell her no more than absolutely necessary. His way of protecting himself--to feel less vulnerable and stressed in the face of her rage--was by telling more and more white lies (even at times when they really weren't required).
In short, each partner's behavior was controlled by a subjective reality of which the other had little (or no) awareness. The only way either could attempt to understand the other was through using themselves as a reference point. And, as I've already suggested, because none of our actions--or reactions--can be assumed to be representative of the rest of humanity, it's dangerous to project what we might think or feel in a particular situation onto another, whose experiential framework may differ acutely from our own.
I can hardly over-emphasize that in this difficult case it was only through my recalling what I had already learned about this woman's emotionally unstable childhood that I could adequately comprehend--and sympathetically appreciate--her quasi-paranoid habit of circumventing anticipated attacks by counter-attacking at the first hint of perceived criticism. Recognizing the abusive origins of her exaggerated reaction to my "bad hair day" analogy, and realizing that her personal history had virtually taught her that "the best defense was a good offense," I could avoid becoming defensive with her in turn. I could empathize with her, at the same time I suggested that her immediate reactions to me might be grounded far more in her past experiences than in the present-day analogy that had so provoked her.
This post can offer no easy solutions to the human dilemma of accurately understanding another who might operate on an entirely different set of assumptions, beliefs, rules, and values. Empathy--the mostly learned ability to identify with the feelings and perceptions of another--is an emotional-intellectual capacity that most children can demonstrate only in its most embryonic form. If our own empathy is to become more "educated," if we are to broaden and refine it over time, we need to learn more about others. We need to appreciate how their early environment, and particular temperament and sensibility, determine their particular orientation toward reality.
We can become increasingly adept at recognizing the thoughts and feelings of others (however unlike our own they may be), only if we realize that--finally--none of us is "generic." So if we're to better comprehend others' behavior, we must first endeavor to know them better. Only then--when we can put ourselves in their different-sized, different-fitting shoes--can we begin to create within ourselves their own "unique" experience.
