Empathy and sympathy are vastly different. A clear empathic way to help those who are down with depression can make our communities stronger.
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The lesson in this video has been a hard one for me to learn. In fact, I still struggle with the “man-box” idea of trying to “make things better” or “solve the problem.” Dr Brené Brown’s offers direct communication to help ease someone’s pain and suffering. Her advice makes it easy for me to remember how to genuinely be there when the loves of my life are down in the dumps.
One of the stumbling blocks for a guy like me is tapping into my own emotional experience of pain and suffering without reliving it in the remembered moment. Then I have to remember I am here for a love of my life right now. My past is done and dealt with, but I can use my past pain to help identify with the person I need to be there for.
For me, it is pretty easy to remember this cue:
“I don’t even know what to say right now. I’m just so glad you told me.”
The next time I am facing someone who is drowning in a sea of the blues, I will know exactly what to do.
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The GMP has posted this video before, so I’ll reiterate my thoughts from last time: I thought that was a very good and concrete explanation of a perspective on sympathy vs empathy. By that definition provided, most people, of course, would prefer the empathy over the sympathy. From that perspective, empathy is all unqualified and unconditional validation; which, admittedly, is sometimes exactly what we want and need from other people (whether we’re able or willing to articulate that to others when it is so, or not). But it’s also very one-way; in the sense that it’s very much all ‘take’ and… Read more »