“We live by what we get, but we live by what we give” – Winston Churchill
What does empathy mean?
The term empathy was originally associated with looking at works of art. A kind of fusion with the object of the work. The ability to empathize, to empathize with something. I put myself in the other person’s state of mind.
The expression for empathy is mostly compassion, the ability to empathize. For a moment I feel what the other feels.
Is this possible? Neurophysiological tests and brain imaging procedures have proven that almost the same areas of the brain are stimulated. And for those who are deficient or absent, for example in extreme cases of the autism spectrum, this synchronous phenomenon, which is also called “mirror neurons”, is often not detectable.
Empathetic skills work in all of us, and we can catch ourselves with a simple thought experiment. Imagine that we see a door slam on someone’s finger. At that moment we flinch, our whole body reacts. Why? For a moment, the feeling that the other can experience appears in us. Research has also established that I don’t necessarily need to see the specific event. It is enough if someone tells the story, and I can see his face and hear the pain in his voice. In fact, it’s enough to imagine. The stimulation of neurons appears in the given brain area in the same way.
“Sympathy”, means that we both feel the same. We feel what you feel together. I connect with the part of me that hurts just as much.
How does empathy develop?
Why is it that there are those who are less able to do it, and there are those among us who are very able to resonate with the feelings of others? When a baby is born, it lives in a very close symbiosis with its mother for a few months. Then, after the close connection and fusion, it just starts to separate. (Margaret Mahler) To become aware of one’s own self, to develop self-awareness and begin the path of individualization and independence. In the symbiotic phase, immediately after birth, the mother enters a very open, receptive state, characterized by the so-called primary maternal turning (Donald Winnicott), when she is sensitive to every vibration of her child. In this attunement, she senses exactly the needs behind the signals and can respond adequately to them. At first, she senses what might be behind the different types of crying, and later she recognizes it consciously. Countless neurophysiological studies have proven that the same brain areas are stimulated, so-called mirror neurons, in the baby and in the mother. (“Why do I feel what you feel?”)
If a child has experienced this kind of empathic turning in this early period, there is a good chance that He/she him/herself will be able to tune in to the emotions of others. On the part of the mother, the phase when separation and individualization (Margaret Mahler), the so-called re-approach phase, requires special maturity and sensitivity. When the child enjoys his independence, saying “I can do it”, he/she sometimes becomes insecure and hides back in the mother’s closeness, fusion, and symbiosis, which means security. This often manifests itself in ambivalent behavior. He/she runs to his mother, then angrily pushes her away, fearing independence, longing to experience the experience of his/her own self, “I do it!”, “I want it!” “I can do it!”. A sufficiently sensitive mother does not see this as an attack on her own person, and is able to ensure optimal, flexible adaptation to various extremes, by approximately satisfying the current needs. It can create a kind of restraining function, a safe space to tolerate debauchery. Of course, there is no perfect mother who does everything exactly according to the child’s needs. That’s not the goal. The child can learn from the smallest frustration. Dealing with it, tolerating the tension, developing internal resources for it.
The phenomenon of empathy is mirroring, which appears in movements in the same way as in the stimulation of different areas of the brain. It appears in the body position, gestures, facial expressions, voice, pace of movement and speech. In fact, often even in the breathing rhythm. Examining an 8-month-old baby and his mother, they found that they constantly mirror each other’s movements. It can be monitored with micro-analysis video tests that if one of them leans forward, the other one too. If he leans back, the other one follows almost immediately. He stretches his hand, and in the next moment the other one fits into it as well. This reflection remains an important element of empathy, emotional turning towards the other person, tuning in. If someone didn’t really get out of this empathic turn in the early period, it will be more difficult for them to offer it to the other person in their other relationships.
What does it manifest itself in?
- At the level of thought: first, the ability to put on the other person’s glasses, to understand their points of view, to be able to observe and refer to them without judgment.
- Empathy at the level of feelings: the intuition of the other person’s feelings appears. We feel his feelings, as well as what needs lie behind those feelings, what he lacks. We feel the other’s pain. We connect with their own pain. This is what we want to save sometimes. They are often workers in the helping professions. “I can’t cry with all my patients” who says this, he is afraid that he will be lost in it. He is only willing to connect with his professional part, removing the human from it. What he is afraid of is merging with the other, confluence in professional terms, not empathy.
- At the level of action: we try to express our sympathy with our behavior, which is also not necessarily conscious: turning towards you, hugging, making eye contact, drawing closer. At the same time, words, interest, openness, signs of acceptance and inclusion may appear.
An important element of empathy is presence, we remain in the situation, I connect to that part of me that feels the same even when it hurts. I let myself in, I’m there with him. At the same time, I don’t get lost in it. I can hold our own. Buddha: “do nothing, be present”. Sometimes that’s the hardest part.
How to avoid empathy?
What do we unconsciously do so that the other’s pain does not hurt?
We judge, we are unable to put on the other person’s glasses. “Why didn’t you do that…”. “Of course, because you’re too sensitive.” “You shouldn’t have done this or that”.
We’re sorry, we want to comfort you: “Oh, you poor thing”, “But at least…”. We try to draw your attention to something that is evaluated as positive.
We try to provide solutions and advice immediately. These communication manifestations are called communication barriers by Thomas Gordon. Which, instead of building a bridge between us in accepting the other person’s feeling and responding to it with empathy, my attitude tries to block the emotion coming from him. In this case, the other is even more left alone with it.
It can also be a kind of escape from experiencing empathy, the kind of “faith in a just world” that everything happens for a reason. If someone has a problem or trouble, they deserve it, because everyone is the forge of their own destiny. So instead of empathy, it is easier to relate with a kind of blame. In such cases, we can spare it to connect to the part of us that resonates, that also feels pain.
Does everyone feel empathy?
The absence or reduction of empathy can occur in personality disorders, narcissistic, borderline, socio, and psychopathic conditions, in addition to people with autism. In such cases, there was most likely some kind of disturbance in early childhood development, in the infant-mother relationship, in bonding. The environment was not responsive to the child’s needs. Either the child experienced rejection, a cold, harsh mother, or the opposite, the one who emotionally engulfed and overwhelmed him all the time.
In both cases, it is as if a wall has been built between the Self and the experience of emotions. With this, the child was able to avoid his pain. This was a positive strategy for him at the time, it meant staying alive. Later, however, in your relationships, precisely because of this, you may lack the ability to emotionally tune in to the other person.
A well-known actor announced on social media not long ago that he is a proven, medically certified psychopath. He tells her that he knows exactly what he should feel, but he doesn’t. He doesn’t care about the other person’s feelings. Not even your children’s. And he doesn’t care that he doesn’t.
In extreme, narcissistic personality disorder, turning towards the needs of the other may often appear, but this is often based on some conscious or unconscious underlying interest. For example, it is important for him to create a positive self-image in the eyes of others, so that they see him as a good person. For them, this is one of the most important needs.
People with borderline personality disorder can tune in to others incredibly sensitively, they can accurately sense their vulnerability, their needs, their unconscious needs. They can connect creatively, easily, and spontaneously, but at the same time, all of this is based on momentary mood or interests and is just as fragile or fleeting as in a narcissistic personality disorder. From one moment to the next, it can become nothing, like a bursting balloon that went up in the sky, but nothing left is just a small piece of rubber that falls to the ground.
Like the other person’s personality disorder, if their interests demand something else, if the relationship has become unnecessary for them, they can turn their backs in an instant.
What happens in the meantime, what takes place in them?
Avoidance mechanisms help us to avoid having to face painful or unpleasant internal contents. And one of their characteristic prevention mechanisms is the so-called splitting, the way of seeing in black and white. At the beginning of the relationship, they lift someone up, make them feel all-powerful, project positive things, project onto them, and then suddenly they end up in the opposite extreme, by projecting different kinds of internal content onto them, the same person who hasn’t changed anything can get the most horrible rating. In fact, it has nothing to do with this process taking place in the other, and often does not even understand what happened. The turn takes place in the borderline person himself, with a change in his projected content.
Why can’t we always empathize?
What could be the reason why someone who would otherwise feel empathy is not “willing” to sympathize in a conflict situation?
The biggest obstacle to empathy is our own pain.
Some examples from the story of one of my clients, who visited the place of his childhood, special experiences came alive in him and he wanted to share this with his mother, who suddenly said, “I don’t care, stop”.
What happened?
I wonder why the mother could react in this way to her child’s experiences, moods, and experiences from her childhood, when she would have needed the intimacy, closeness, and compassion of the other? Instead of empathy, why did you get complete rejection and closure? All this with a rude remark: “I don’t care”. Most likely, the mother had other memories of this period. He didn’t want to go into his own memories and experiences. Her own pain did not enable her to respond empathetically to her child’s experiences.
Another example is when a wife wanted to talk about her husband’s childhood injuries. “I was glad that I have to listen to the disappointed child again, when I too need support.”
This clearly implies that if both people experience pain in a situation, it is more difficult to connect to the empathic part. The same phrase, “may He ask forgiveness.” These are the situations when we cannot accept the pain of others in addition to our own pain.
Cheating is a typical situation in a relationship. One of them sees the deception, the betrayal, the terrible pain that engulfs him. His own humiliation, his hurt. And the other is often the road leading there, its helplessness, failure, not noticing its signs. He often excuses himself by saying that the lie was a noble gesture, since it allowed the family to stay together. This type of attitude in such cases distances two people even more. Instead of opening to each other’s feelings, more walls are built between them.
Empathy or sympathy?
How to give empathy with words. This is what we learn the least in our own culture, during our socialization. What does empathy mean? Tuning in to the other’s feelings and needs. When I use words to say “I see it hurts”, “huh, this can be difficult”. When we say that I hear, feel, see what you live, what you experience. I don’t want to change you, I live your feeling while I’m here, I’m present and I hold myself. Tuning in to the other’s needs: “Safety would have been important to you”, “You would have liked to feel important”. These needs are general human needs present in all of us in our relationships. Due to the lack of these, our negative thoughts and feelings such as anger, poison, temper, and anger are created. It is not the other person’s behavior that causes our negative feelings, but our own unmet needs. The most important of these are acceptance, understanding, compassion, turning to feel important in the relationship, recognition, support, positive communication, honesty, openness, balance, reciprocity. The lack of these is what causes pain, disappointment or even anger, anger, and temper tantrums.
According to Brené Brown, the steps of empathy:
- I should perceive the other person’s perspective and perspective
- Do not judge, do not break a stick over him.
- Connect with him, with the part of me that feels the same
- I express this with words and gestures
Sympathy, on the other hand, is consolation, sympathy, regret. For example, if one of my children failed, the answer was sympathetic: “but at least the other 5th grader.” On the other hand, the empathic expression: “it can hurt you a lot” or “it would be important for you to see him happy and safe”
Typical examples can be found in healthcare. During one of our trainings, I asked the doctors sitting there what exactly they say when someone is diagnosed with a serious condition. The first answer: “Don’t take it to heart! No, it’s such a big problem. There are very good therapeutic solutions to treat this.” If we look at this sentence, it typically covers the category of “sympathy”. Another similar sentence: “Then I will tell you what will happen.” Downplaying the problem and offering an immediate solution. On the other hand, when someone is faced with a problem, he gets into a kind of regressive state, becomes distraught, shocked, not at all receptive to the immediate, adult-like, objective solution search. The third answer is even more aloof: “Please pull yourself together, let’s discuss what options you have!” And in this there is complete emotional distance, even a kind of instruction and command, without a minimum of empathy.
Empathy in body language
One of the most important parts of this is the eye contact, the turning body position, the open gestures, the mirroring of the other’s movements, matching them, in facial expressions, tone, and emphasis.
Helen Riess created an acronym for the elements of empathic connection (The power of empathy: Helen Riess at TEDxMiddlebury) The acronym: E.M.P.A.T.H.Y. With the help of this, we can record the key elements of how we can create a compassionate relationship with others
• E: Eye contact
The first indicator that someone notices us. The importance of the gaze can be traced back to infancy. In this case, the focus distance of the babies is 12 cm, which is the same as the distance between the eyes of the mother and her child when she holds her baby in her arms. Eye contact plays an important role, even when we say hello to each other. In the Zulu language, for example, when saying hello, translated into Hungarian, they say “I see you”. All people need to be seen, noticed and respected, to which eye contact is the first step.
• M: Muscles of facial expression
Our face can be seen as a map of our feelings. This ability can be lifesaving, for example, if someone eats spoiled food and grimaces at it. This sends an immediate signal to your entire tribe. Or when your friend’s face looks scared as a ball fly towards your head. Or even a flirty look that can help us find the love we’re looking for.
• P: Posture
Posture is another important element of connection. We can send messages to others through our open or closed posture. In research where a group of doctors were asked to sit down while working, they were evaluated as more positive, more valued, more caring and spent 3-5x more time with their patients compared to their colleagues who used the same words. but they stood.
• A: Affect
The concept is the scientific definition of expressed emotions. When we are with someone and try to figure out what they are thinking. This affects how we interpret what they say. Do we see and hear the emotions and needs behind the words?
Like our mother once upon a time, when instead of words, only crying and the meaning of sounds were authoritative for her.
Yet, if he was sufficiently empathic and sensitive, he could accurately perceive the feeling, request, and needs behind the signs.
• T: Tone of voice
We have all heard the tremor in the voice of someone who is about to cry, or the sharpness in the voice of someone who is angry. When we are emotionally activated, our tone of voice and facial expression also change, without us consciously trying to influence it.
• H: Hearing the whole person
To hear more than the other’s words. The point is to understand the other person in their full context, with openness and without judgment.
• Y: Your response
We constantly react to other people’s feelings, not just our own. Most feelings are mutual. Think of how we see a sensitive goodbye at the airport. Our own feelings and experiences will reflect this. Our brains are programmed for empathy because our survival may depend on it.
Can empathy be learned or developed?
Opinions are divided on this. For example, with the Big5 tests, the five traits and abilities that cannot really be changed and characterize the personality in a stable way, usually in all cultures, are examined. In most BIG5 tests, empathy appears as a kind of gift, which is often the exact opposite of a practical, individual, interest-oriented approach to business. At the same time, according to others, and according to my own experience, it can be changed, shaped, and improved to some extent. The condition is that someone is motivated and has self-reflection. With insight into yourself, your feelings, thoughts, behavior and needs.
It can be partially approached through posture, observing metacommunication, and recognizing facial expressions. By becoming aware of the external signs of emotions. For the first time, I get to know it, understand it in my head, “I understand the feeling”. This part can certainly be learned and developed, but at the same time, in many cases, it also brings with it the appearance of emotions. The fact that certain body positions and certain emotions are associated with them is especially helpful. For actors, when learning improvisation, e.g., one of the instructions: “take the given body position, which would be typical for the given person, and from that will follow the experience, the feeling as well. “
Learning empathy is more successful the earlier we start sensitization. Even in the case of autistic children, a certain degree of development can be achieved.
At the same time, the approach to empathy is different in Western cultures, through our lens, and different in the East. In the East, experiencing unity, the “experience of unity” is much more the breeding ground for empathy. They relate to the experience of their own separate self, self-consciousness, self-esteem, self-evaluation as a kind of false consciousness construction. What is mine? Changing thoughts in our head about ourselves. Moreover, they are merely opinions, subjective findings, often volatile, fleeting thoughts in our heads. We experience, just like our views on the atomic nuclei of the Newtonian world, that we exist separately from each other. Who am I? Someone locked him in a leather bag. (Alan Watts) While we are probably much more closely connected, with a thousand invisible threads. The Eastern way of thinking, the experience of unity, brings with it much more empathy. A saying of an Eastern thinker: “Love is the cessation of the separation of the self and the other.” A Buddhist boy does not step on the beetle not because he is not allowed, but because he experiences, very early on, that he is also the beetle. He is born into this system of thought; he is socialized into it.
Should we always be empathetic? Is empathy positive and forward-looking in all situations?
The empathic skill is tuning in to the other person, sometimes it makes a person vulnerable. In recent years, the term “empath” has spread, someone who is overly sensitive, too empathetic to the feelings of others. If we are empathetic in our relationships and all this is not complemented by the ability to protect our borders, stand up for our own ideas, if the satisfaction of our needs is not mutual, then we become vulnerable. Assertiveness is the kind of asserting one’s interests, when I perceive the other person’s feelings, aspects, and needs, but at the same time I am also empathetic with myself. I perceive my own needs in the same way, I can relate to them, and I am looking for a solution that is mutually beneficial for both of us, considers the needs of both of us.
Empathy, without protecting our boundaries, can make us part of the other’s games. It can draw you into a victim-rescuer role. A drama triangle can develop when one party complains, feels sorry for himself, plays the role of victim, who is too sensitive and empathetic, and he enters the role of savior by sympathizing, trying to help him, giving attention and presence. At the same time, this is not mutual, the energy flow is only from the side of the savior, towards the one playing the victim game. And if the empathic party in the rescuing role notices this and begins to withdraw from it, then the third role appears and becomes a persecutor. The victim tries to pull him back to his original position by creating a sense of guilt and remorse: “How you have changed!” “You used to be such a good person!”, “You’re not the same anymore!”, “What happened to you?”, “I don’t think this and that have a good effect on you.” “Empaths” are usually maximally receptive to this, and the game continues.
In short, empathy is positive and forward-looking if it does not involve self-giving. It does not mean merging with the other and not participating in the other’s game. At the same time, we are empathetic with ourselves and our own needs, we take them into account in the same way as the other’s. What does it mean to be empathic with myself? I pay attention to my own feelings, what I experience, I pay attention to my own needs, I recognize and understand what needs lie behind my feelings. I pay attention to their satisfaction; I pay attention to reciprocity in the relationship. I also take time for myself to be in my own company, I also pay attention to myself. And if necessary, I try to enforce the satisfaction of my own needs, I do not subordinate myself, I strive for mutual satisfaction. In the long term, it remains positive for us if this is reflected in our relationships, if we sense our boundaries, protect them, and stand up for our own needs, i.e., we are at least as empathetic with ourselves.
Compassion lifts us up, lifts the other, creates a space in which we both have access to our creative parts. We are inspired, we have access to our inner resources.
Empathy is the space of healing, of real healing.
“We are in the world to live in harmony. Those who understand this will no longer fight.” – Buddha
