Spotlight: Catherine Schofield
Discover the power of active listening and empathy through Catherine’s college journey and her exploration of serious illness communication work.
“I think at this stage of our life when we’re working on crafting a life of love—figuring out the recipe for it—we have to really understand ourselves to know how we can best make an impact."
-Catherine Schofield
Catherine Schofield graduated from Boston College in 2021 where she studied Biology with minors in Italian Studies and Medical Humanities, Health, and Culture. In her free time, Catherine loves writing, exploring nature, and all things Italian. During our conversation, she shared her discovery of her love of practicing active listening and empathy in her relationships— and how she “took stock” of her college experiences to search for a job that would be a great fit. She now works in the field of serious illness communication where she finds joy in doing meaningful work and seeing her values come to life. Read about her journey below!
An Early Love of Listening
Catherine Schofield has always loved listening.
From a young age, she was curious about people, finding great pleasure in listening attentively while those around her expressed their unique perspectives. She appreciated the diversity in the friendships she formed throughout her adolescence, as her curious nature drew her to individuals with a wide range of interests and beliefs.
When she arrived at Boston College, Catherine’s curiosity continued to draw her toward others with a listening posture. While she loved the connections she formed as she grew to know and understand her college friends, as time passed, she found herself wondering, “Do they really know who I am? Is it just me listening all of the time? Is that such a bad thing?”
But Catherine soon came to learn that her inclination toward listening in her conversations did not diminish her unique value and identity. In fact, it became an attribute that she would use not only in her relationships but also in her future career.
Moments of Realization
There were several moments on her journey when she began to see active listening as a tool that she could use to live more purposefully. She remembers reading an article that named the term “active listening” and coming to understand it as a skill she could develop and use to understand others.
She also points to a conversation with a friend who thanked her for listening with sincere attention and for moving the conversation forward. This friend helped her to see her experience in a new light: “There was a reason people were talking and opening up to me. They felt like I heard and saw them.”
These discoveries opened her eyes to see what she was doing: “[Listening] is not passive even though I felt like it was sometimes. It’s actually very active and thoughtful, and it’s a skill that people can work on. I wasn’t perfect at it but it was something I had an affinity for. I really wanted to understand people, and I worked towards that through listening.”
She also identified her appreciation for empathy through an activity she did with a BC service program. In this activity, ‘core values’ were scattered across a bingo sheet. The exercise involved circling ten values that were important to her, then crossing out five, then three, then two, until only one remained. The value that stared back at her on the page was empathy. This was an important moment when she could definitively see this value on paper and identify its significance in her life.
While at BC, Catherine immersed herself in a variety of service experiences that brought her joy. She was especially fond of her experience in a service-immersion program called Appa, which led spring break service trips each year to Appalachia.
Like many of us, Catherine had this perception that in order to serve others you had to do it in a very specific volunteer capacity. However, this changed for her during our sophomore year when we took an elective together known as PULSE, a popular program at BC that incorporates theology, philosophy, and an immersive service-learning experience. She shares the impact of Professor McMenamin’s teachings on her view of service– expanding her perspective to realize that “your whole life can be of service.”
She reflects, “[Professor McMenamin] was very influential because he helped teach me not to have a separation between the life I wanted to build and my career. It’s all part of it. It’s not just a job. It’s also a reflection of your values.”
“Taking Stock” of Her College Experiences
As Catherine was “taking stock” of her college experiences for the post-grad career discernment and job search process, she remembered her discoveries about active listening, empathy, and service. She landed her current role in serious illness communication and found that it was a wonderful fit for her.
“It’s a really interesting culmination of the work I did at BC. At the time, the experiences and the classes and clubs I enjoyed felt somewhat random. Looking back, I realized there were the threads of service, community, and interdisciplinary thinking.”
Serious illness communication centers around making people feel known and cared for and honoring what matters most to them.
Reflecting on how service has informed her work, she shares, “It’s all about giving people dignity and meeting people exactly where they are and just having love for people in these vulnerable moments of their lives. And that can happen on Appa when you're serving somebody in need of a house, and they've been brave enough to ask for help and accept the help. And that translates to serious illness care later on when people may be very vulnerable in their lives.”
She also appreciates the collaborative nature of the work, naming this as an important value in her own life.
While Catherine is able to look back on the “winding path” that led her to her current role through reflection, she acknowledges that it can be difficult to trust ourselves in this process. She explains that self-awareness was key in helping her identify a post-grad job she truly loves and reminds us that we cannot separate ourselves from the process of finding purposeful work.
“I think at this stage of our life when we’re working on crafting a life of love– figuring out the recipe for it– we have to really understand ourselves to know how we can best make an impact.”
Engaging in Serious Illness Communication
Catherine is just beginning her career. Over this past year and a half, she has been able to see the values she holds dear come to life in tangible ways. As she and her team work towards the vision of learning what matters most to every person affected by serious illness to ensure their goals and values align with the care they receive, Catherine sees the great beauty and impact of active listening.
In serious illness conversations and in conversations in our daily lives, she reflects, “I think it’s about asking the right questions, then taking the time to really listen to the answers. It feels important to express some tangible way of showing that you listened, whether through an action or change or simply through a thoughtful response.”
She also understands the way in which listening gives us a more complete picture of the people we interact with: “True active listening is actually listening and retaining it and building your file on the person in your mind.”
Whether we are working in a profession that relies on the values of empathy and active listening to serve patients with greater care, or we want to navigate our everyday relationships with greater compassion and patience, Catherine’s journey reminds us that we can live out these values in every season of our lives.
Catherine’s Invitation to You
Reflection Questions:
Reflect on what traits or habits you have that may be more valuable than you think. How can you continue to grow in these areas and bring them into other realms of your life?
Think about a situation in which you felt truly heard and seen by someone else. What did they do well? How can you try these strategies when listening to others?
What are your core values? How do you believe your current work (at school, at a job, through a hobby or passion) ties in these values?
Resources Catherine loves: