Empathy can be literally defined as:
em·pa·thy [ émpəthee ]
- understanding of another’s feelings:the ability to identify with and understand somebody else’s feelings or difficulties
- attribution of feelings to an object:the transfer of somebody’s own feelings and emotions to an object such as a painting
[ Early 20th century. < Greek empatheia "affection, passion" ]
Ashoka Fellow Molly Barker, Founder of Girls on the Run International®, who has been working to build-up Ashoka’s Empathy Initiative. suggests the following:
Empathy has been a hot topic at the summit. Typically considered a soft skill and not necessarily essential to leadership (at least in the traditional sense), Bill Drayton, Founder of Ashoka, has uncovered a number of thematic connections between all of those folks who are social entrepreneurs. Empathy has been and continues to be at the top of that list.
Empathy is one of those things … “things” because I’m not sure precisely what to call it … that I’ve taken for granted. I was raised in a very empathetic home. My family members are empathetic. My children are empathetic and most everyone – heck, EVERYONE! – I work with is empathetic. I’ve naturally, based on my own experiences, assumed that most people would understand why empathy is essential to being human … a kind of “duh” sort of thing. A clear and VERY obvious outcome of Girls on the Run is the ability of every girl and coach to give and receive within an empathetic context.
In my mind, without empathy we lack the ability to deeply connect with another living creature. Empathy affords us the experience of being one in experience with another, putting aside our own ego, the need to be right, and being with the emotions of another. It doesn’t mean fixing them, making the emotions go away or enabling the individual. To me it simply means being with their emotions without interference from me.
via So how do you get empathy, anyway? (Hint: You won’t find it in a lecture.) | Ashoka.org.
As an advocate, I am always under the impression that being with empathy is demonstrating a concern and understanding of the here and now of the caller/person communicating with (no matter the mode of communication). It isn’t a time of formulating one’s opinion of the situation; it is more important to sort through options and more options for the situation given at hand, as well as providing emotional support and guidance for catapulting forwarding to the light at the end of the tunnel, in order to move forward to, hopefully, without the burdens of the crisis situations at hand.
People need to have a voice in their lives moving forward, they need to see and weigh out the options available for them (because when in crisis mode, you rarely see through the mist of the tears caused by the emotional and/or physical pain currently enduring); however, they need to know that they aren’t crazy, that they have lives that are valued, and that they can do things and make great decisions that affect their own lives, as well as those around them.
How do YOU see empathy? How do you apply empathy in your daily lives?
I think empathy is something we can learn to feel when it’s modeled to us by parents, teachers, others. It is something I’ve deliberately tried to nurture in my children. I wrote a post on the topic here at http://tidbitsandnuggets.wordpress.com/2011/05/17/what-empathy-is-and-what-it%E2%80%99s-not/
Enjoyed reading yours!
Inglath Cooper
Thank you, Inglath! Nurturing it in our children is on high priority indeed. So many of the newest generation seems desensitized by all the violence and seem complacent to much of the emotional aspects of the world, although once they discover their passions, they are very passionate about their causes. Empathy is definitely needed to get to the root of our passions though; once someone understands that, the obtaining the great results of our passionate advocacies becomes easier to catapult and, hopefully, obtain the satisfaction that we can make a difference in other people’s live on a bigger and grander scale than we could ever imagine.
To begin nurturing to our children, it is always helpful if we have great role models to help us pass it on to others. If we don’t have those role models, we can still learn how to become with a great understanding of empathy for others through finding of great role models in our communities, reading books, practicing new things as we learn, and sharing knowledge among others.
Kudos for being able to nurture others, including your own children.