We all do it. A close friend or relative is struggling with a personal problem and because we love them so much we take on the problem as if it were our own.

I remember my mother-in-law, Gisele, talking to me about this a few years ago. She had this vision that there were two boats in the water. One was getting banged around by the waves because it was unattended, while the other one was swerving all over the place because there were two people trying to steer it.

She later realized that the unattended boat was her own while the other boat belonged to one of her loved ones. As she zoned in on the boat she could see that she was indeed the second person at the steering wheel fighting for which direction she thought the boat should go.