Compassionate Relationship: Empathy, Sympathy and Compassion

Most people have conflicts in their relationships and fail to resolve them because they confuse between empathy, sympathy and compassion. This confusion can be caused by either person in the relationship. It can be a result of ineffective expectations or insufficient support. Regardless the reason, life, the ultimate examiner, would give a "Fail! Big time!" on this test.

Understanding the difference between the three is essential to passing the relationship test.

Empathy

Empathy is when you notice and understand the other persons' situation, experience, perspective or feelings. It does not mean you share their feelings, agree with them or have been asked to share your judgment, thoughts or ideas. It definitely does not mean you need to solve their problem.

The best way to proceed is to say, "I can see that you are very disappointed and upset", or just be a sounding board and repeat back to them what they said, "So you are sad because he was rude to you. I can understand why". Often times, people only want empathy. Someone to talk to that will understand their perspective and feelings. Empathy is a way to give support with your presence.

 

Sympathy

Sympathy is a step forward in the relationship. It is not simply understanding the other persons' perspective or feelings but feeling the same feeling yourself. It is completely adopting the other person's reaction to the problem. A person who is showing sympathy mirrors the other person's perspective and feelings, as in, "Puts himself in the other person's shoes" (note: sympathy greeting cards are in fact empathy cards, because we do not feel exactly the same as the person experiencing the pain. We can imagine how he or she feels, but in a different way).

The challenge with sympathy is that it limits your ability to help and support the other person. If your friend/sibling/partner/child feels helpless, there is no point in feeling helpless at the same time, right?

Parents and their children struggle greatly with the sympathy test. This is because parents whose children are insulted feel the insult themselves. Likewise, children who watch their parents fight, take the hard feelings on themselves and carry it around with them. In coaching, for example, the coach must avoid sympathy in order to help the client overcome and manage the overwhelming emotion. This is a skill that was challenging for me at the beginning of my special education career. But as they say, "Practice makes perfect". Sympathy is a way to help another person by being in total agreement with their perspective and feelings.

Compassion

 

Compassion derives from the Latin "patior" and the Greek "pathein", meaning to suffer, undergo or experience. It means to experience something with another person. It requires us to put ourselves in another person's shoes, immerse ourselves in his/her point of view, feel the pain as if it is ours, and yet keep the focus on the other person without being paralyzed by their feeling. Compassion is the combination of empathy and action, in the desire to help, without the hopelessness attributed to sympathy. When you are compassionate, the focus is on helping the other person to deal with his/her challenge, without judging them.

Sometimes, the offer to help is enough to pass the relationship test. Bear in mind that compassion does not mean doing for others what they cannot do themselves, or making them do what you think they should have done (which is judgment). It is more offering a helping hand to do something that goes in line with what they want to achieve.