Not everyone is on board with empathy. Between Paul Bloom’s book, “Against Empathy,” and a recent study presented in Forbes that talks about the disingenuous character of empathy in the workplace, empathy isn’t always easy or right. Last week, Nicci Kadilak’s piece entitled, “Addict, A short story about empathy and the stories we tell ourselves” opens up a difficult area, at least for me: having empathy for someone who is struggling, in this case, with addiction. As the story goes, we wind our own stories about things and the people around us. When someone you’re close to has a serious issue, such as depression or addiction, it can open up wounds within ourselves. It can be a pathway into our own darker side. Are we then able to rise above the internal narratives to lean into the specific situation and context in front of us? How do we calm our own fears and doubts to allow for the serenity and openness necessary when we’re dealing with someone who’s suffering?
You ask such important and insightful questions, Minter. Sometimes we try to help people while triggered and weighed by our own issues and baggage. It's very hard to "see" it of course, but if the empathy is not working for others - or ourselves - for that matter it behooves us to step back and evaluate what's really going on here and why? To continue on with a prescription which is causing both the patient and the purported healer more pain is certainly to be questioned. That doesn't mean we shy away from empathy as a "practice" of sorts, because it’s essential in human interaction, but that we try to be honest in both its outcomes and its motivations...perhaps a good Rx for most of life anyway :-)
You ask such important and insightful questions, Minter. Sometimes we try to help people while triggered and weighed by our own issues and baggage. It's very hard to "see" it of course, but if the empathy is not working for others - or ourselves - for that matter it behooves us to step back and evaluate what's really going on here and why? To continue on with a prescription which is causing both the patient and the purported healer more pain is certainly to be questioned. That doesn't mean we shy away from empathy as a "practice" of sorts, because it’s essential in human interaction, but that we try to be honest in both its outcomes and its motivations...perhaps a good Rx for most of life anyway :-)