Hey #93: Are you confusing empathy with compassion? STOP! It’s affecting your relationships.
Understanding the differences between compassion and empathy.
What is empathy?
Empathy is the ability to feel others' emotions and being able to understand them by putting oneself in their shoes.
In practice, empathy looks like:
validating others' emotions, instead of trying to fix them
being aware of the responsibility that emotional management is
giving others safe-space in the mayhem of their emotions, without taking anything personally
keeping subjective reality at the center of interaction, instead of fixating on an objective truth
allowing people to express themselves and understanding them with full attention
Some of the phrases which we use to show empathy are:
I'm sorry that you had to go through this. I can only imagine how hard this must be for you.
I understand what you're saying. Please feel free to share more.
I hear you. And I'm here for you.
Things get more interesting when we start using empathy and compassion interchangeably.
Unknowingly, we’ve seemed to believe: Empathy = Compassion
But..
Empathy ≠ Compassion
An empathetic person is not always compassionate. Whereas, a compassionate person is always empathetic.
Read that again, if you may.
If we imagine two concentric circles, empathy will sit at the center. And compassion will surround it.
To oversimplify, we can say that compassion is the next level of empathy.
Okay, but what exactly is compassion?
Compassion is the intention to take actions and help others navigate their inner world of thoughts and feelings.
Compassion is not just about understanding others. But about “doing” something with the understanding gained through empathy.
When empathy says, "I understand you..."; Compassion asks, "I understand you. Now tell me how can I help you?"
This question "How can I help you?" sets compassion apart from empathy.
You may think that understanding can itself be the highest form of "act" to help others.
And I must say, you're right in thinking so.
In some cases, understanding is the highest form of act to help others. These are the cases in which we can't do anything else for the other person, except for understanding them.
Then there are cases in which we can do much more than understanding them. Yet we don't. Because doing much more, aka practicing compassion challenges us on multiple levels. As it includes:
Asking them how they want to be helped by putting aside the notions of how we think they want to be helped
Taking the risk of creating awkwardness by asking the question, “How would you like to be helped right now?”
Managing the confusion of "Will I actually be able to help them?" and asking the question anyway
Swallowing the pride to be told, "No that's not what I need right now..."
Being mindful of the help they're needing and the help we're comfortable in providing
That's what practicing compassion is all about.
Empathy doesn't do any of it.
It listens. It understands. And its job is done.
To understand the difference between empathy and compassion better, I want you to go to your memory and replay a situation in which you were able to understand what the other person was going through.
The understanding was so deep that it occurred to you as if you were going through the stuff they were going through. (For some of us, that understanding may be so so so deep. Whereas for others, it may not. Whatever the case, it's fine. Focus on the understanding you felt, instead of the extent of that understanding.)
Sit with that understanding for a while.
They were hurting. You were there for them and understanding them.
You may have told them…
Did you also show willingness to help them by actions?
Did you say "How can I help you feel better?"?
Did you utter the words "I'm here for you. And I'd like to help you the way you want to be helped. So tell me what can I do for you?"?
Going by my experience, I'll say that only a few of us will answer yes to the last few questions I asked.
Heck, if you had asked me the same questions a few months back, I'd have said no.
The reason is:
We seem to have taken empathy as the endgame of our sensitivity. But empathy is the beginning. Compassion is the endgame.
There’s a perspective shift needed so that we can understand the following differences:
Empathy is the awareness of others’ emotional reality and an intent to feel others’ emotions from their perspective.
Compassion is the wish to take action to help others.
Empathy is you-oriented. It’s you, your awareness, your attempt to understand others.
Compassion is them-oriented. It’s them, what they need, their suffering that you desire to help them relieve.
Empathy allows you to understand.
Compassion compels you to act.
Sharing situation-based examples:
You witness someone trip and fall. Empathy is feeling the sting of the fall yourself. Compassion is helping them up and checking if they're alright.
You see a friend crying. Empathy is feeling sadness because you can understand their pain. Compassion is offering them a hug or ask them what's wrong because you want to help them feel better.
You see a colleague excited about a new project they're working on. Empathy is feeling a similar sense of drive. Compassion is offering to help them brainstorm ideas, provide resources, or simply celebrate their passion for the project.
I'm not saying that empathy is not as important as compassion. If that's what you're interpreting, re-read the edition from the beginning.
Empathy is the soul of compassion. Without empathy, compassion can't exist.
At the same time, empathy can't replace compassion.
Maybe you've already been taking actions to help others (the way THEY want to be helped) in navigating the confusion of their emotional reality. And you've been calling it your empathy.
Maybe you've been doing your best to put yourself in others' shoes and to give them the understanding. And you've been calling it your compassion.
Whatever the case, I'm not here to tell you which is right and which is wrong.
All I want is to give you a perspective where you keep empathy different from compassion. And you see both of them as individual entities which thrive mutually and deepen your relationships beyond measure.
For the people who are learning to be empathetic, this may seem too much. And it's fine. Don't pressure yourself. Take it one step at a time.
I had taken it one step at a time.
Gradually, I’ve reached a stage where I’m able to observe myself escaping practicing compassion (yet at the same time wishing to be compassionate lol). I now take such a contradiction as an opportunity to feel the discomfort and practice compassion anyway.
The journey has been wonderful. It has gifted me unbound joy and love.
I wish you to experience the same.
Here’s to compassion!
🦋
Until next Thursday,
Ashi
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An empathetic person is not always compassionate. Whereas, a compassionate person is always empathetic. The empathy may completely absent... for example, medical professionals when encounter repeated health challenges of the patients.
This is not well substantiated, but we can move forward with it! Within a large Circle (better a free but closed form) of Engagement, we, in majority, show Pity/ Sympathy/ Empathy etc... and all are marginally separated by language driven definitions.
But our Engagement depends on many other factors, and one being how easy to access the target person really is. Or, how ready (less inhabitant) we are to trespass the emotional fencing the said person has built around them.
If Compassion and Empathy need to be represented, the circles is not very convincing....
The following image may look better
🍳 - Fire is the Compassion - Pan is the Empathy - White is the Sympathy - Yellow is the Pity
But all are not circles, but originating from same point and growing in the same direction, with long axis and short axis
I knew the difference between the two but I had never looked at the distinction that deeply. Thank you, Ashi.