“To increase positive emotions in your life and others’ lives, you must make a habit of filling buckets.”

Being in the helping field, I face a lot of negativity. It makes sense as most people believe that they should only connect with a helper during bad times. If everything was fine, why would they need to see anyone? Thus, I deal with a lot of negativity, concerns, and complaints each and every day for many hours at a time. Does it bother me? Not really! This is a profession that I have chosen and I have the tools and coping methods that I utilize to assist myself within it.

Tom Rath’s How Full Is Your Bucket has many great lessons and one of them includes, “To increase positive emotions in your life and others’ lives, you must make a habit of filling buckets.” It’s a lesson that I not only share with clients, but with myself too.

The filling of figurative buckets is Tom’s way of saying how do you make others feel better (fill them up) and not take away from them (drain them). Not only does filling up other people with positive emotions and feelings help them, it actually helps you. You get a double dose of whatever you dish out. You dish out good, you give good and you get good. You dish out bad, you take away from others and from yourself.

I had a client named Jill who came in to determine what to do about her friend, Fran. Fran was depleting Jill of her ability to stay sane or so Jill had determined. I had shared with her Tom Rath’s book and Jill stated that the book resonated with her. Fran was draining her and wasn’t filling her up and should be dumped. Simple as that. I, then, asked what Jill had done to Fran in reaction to her behaviour. She stated, “I dished it right back.” I laughed. Jill didn’t like that, but then I explained that they were both depleting each other. The clear option was to either break off the friendship or Jill could try filling up the relationship bucket and see what occurred. Jill ended our conversation abruptly and I figured that was the end of that client.

A few weeks later, I received an email from Jill. She indicated that initially I had hurt her feelings by indicating that she had some fault to play in the situation. Yet, she looked at some of her other relationships and realized that she had ended things with too many people. If all those relationships were toxic and only she was the common denominator — perhaps Jill had a small part to play. She had taken Fran out for lunch, sat and listened to her complaints about life, and then commented on how well she was able to put up with everything. That she envied that ability and then Fran complimented her. Soon, a sad start to the lunch turned into reminiscing about good times and making a plan to try and recapture some nostalgia by revisiting a weekend getaway they had done years earlier.

Jill was shocked that a quick change of mind had such a positive result. She was still a bit worrisome about the future, but was proud to say that my ‘stupid’ bucket filling thing actually worked.

Listen, I understand Jill’s thinking. I think Tom’s analogy is a great one, but I can understand why some people don’t want to look around and think that we’re all just bucket holders with some overflowing and some with barely a drop in them. Select your own analogy (bank accounts, teddy bears, etc.) and make it work.

In the end, be good to others and you get more. Be not so good to others and don’t be surprised if life isn’t so kind to you. It really is as simple as, “To increase positive emotions in your life and others’ lives, you must make a habit of filling buckets.”