Skip to main content

Empathy

When I was young, I used to pretend that other people could see through my eyes. More than just seeing what I saw, though, I pretended they could feel the emotions I felt. For the good times, it was a way for me to feel like I was on stage, like the things I was doing were important. For the bad times, it gave my circumstances purpose, like someone would understand what I was experiencing. I remember reading not long ago that maybe what people want, more than to be loved, is to be understood. I think this practice reflected that need in me, though I never could have understood it at that age. It makes me wonder now how much others have that same need, a need to be understood, and makes me think that maybe I should do more to empathize with others. In effect, I would be practicing the exact opposite of the thing I wanted for myself. I would be seeing through other people's eyes.

It all sounds so ideal, but I think it's possible when a person is rooted enough in his or her walk with God to experience the peace he brings. It's that peace that makes it possible to empathize in the first place. Otherwise, you're so immersed in your own problems that you can't see past your own two eyes, and your only wish is that others could see things as you do.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Persuasion

At different points in history, governments have devoted men, women, and resources to try to persuade others to their side. One significant example of this occurred in Germany under Adolf Hitler. Hitler knew how important it was to make sure the German people were on his side as leader of the country. One way he did this was by controlling what people heard. Specifically, near the beginning of World War II, Hitler made it a crime for anyone in Germany to listen to foreign radio broadcasts. These were called the “extraordinary radio measures.” He did this to ensure that Germans weren’t being persuaded by enemy countries to question their loyalty to Hitler. He knew that a German listening to a radio broadcast from Britain might persuade that German to believe that Great Britain was the good guy and Hitler the bad guy. This was so important, in fact, that two people in Germany were actually executed because they had either listened to or planned to listen to a foreign radio broadcast (one...
Post a Comment
Read more

Comparison

Psychologists and others have studied ways in which we compare ourselves to each other. One man named Leon Festinger argued that we tend to compare ourselves to other people when we don’t know how good or bad we are at something (like football or playing the guitar). One way we do this is when we compare ourselves to those who are not as good as we are, to protect our self-esteem (called “downward social comparison;” example: we’re playing basketball and miss most of our shots, but we feel okay because a teammate wasn’t even given the ball). Another comparison we make is when we compare ourselves to others who are doing much better than we are (called “upward social comparison”). When we see others who appear to be doing better than we are, we can respond by trying to improve ourselves, or by trying to protect ourselves by telling ourselves it’s not that important. There was a study published in 1953 by Solomon Asch, who asked students to take part in a “vision test.” The par...
Post a Comment
Read more

Noise

I started writing this on Friday. It's far from perfect, and I might change things around, but it's done for now. It's a narrative poem whose main character loses hope, hears a familiar sound from heaven, and finds himself alive again. It's a spin off of a poem I wrote on as part of another post in January. In any case, I hope you like it. Noise Silent songs stop playing Through chambers cupped and curved Through insides of once softened space Through dreams once less deserved Familiar sound pours forth past gates Past sentries long in dream Reaching ears that long went deaf To roar its endless theme Piercing past the sound of noise Through whispers breathed for free Booming, distant, fast-felt sky Makes its quiet mark on me On again, and up to play Songs come from deep below May not be played for list’ning ears Still thunder soft and slow Mirroring their master’s tune With awkward tarnished rings Played through doubt on hopeful frets Play sile...
Post a Comment
Read more