True Empathy

Empathy is an exercise. A rep of this exercise is considering another person’s point of view, and attempting to wear their shoes, and feel their pain.

We’d like to think we are the empathetic type, that we can easily feel the pain of others. But the exercise of empathy works deeper muscles.

We can only practice empathy when we disagree, or have a different view, than the person with whom we are empathizing. The act of acknowledging a point of view that is firmly outside our own is the point – the very hallmark! – of the exercise of empathy.