E is for Empathy

 

Empathy isn’t something I was born fluent in, it was learned, slowly and sometimes painfully through walking beside suffering I didn’t ask for and wouldn’t wish on anyone.

Empathy is more than feeling bad for someone. It’s sitting with them. It’s listening without trying to fix. It’s resisting the urge to compare stories or rush toward a silver lining. Sometimes empathy looks like words, sometimes it looks like silence and often, it looks like simply staying.

Life has ways of teaching empathy through experience. I think mine started when I was a little girl, my dad was sick with heart issues and Emphysema, then as a young adult I started my career as a CNA and then LNA, often sitting with residents who were afraid, alone, feeling sick, or dying. Spending time and helping care for friends I loved dearly, as they battled cancer and ultimately passed away. Even though I have had many life experiences that have taught me to be empathetic, I think being married to, loving and walking through life with Mike who has been ill for so long, has deepened it even more. Because I’ve watched someone I love endure endless appointments, procedures, setbacks and exhaustion, I’ve been living in survival mode for so long, I now recognize pain even when it isn’t spoken. I notice it in people’s eyes, in their pauses, expressions and in the way they say “I’m fine,” when they clearly are not.

Empathy has changed how I see the world. I try not to assume, I try to soften my tone in an empathetic, but not patronizing way. I try to give grace more freely, because I’ve needed it myself.

I know now that empathy doesn’t require me to necessarily understand every detail of someone’s story. It simply asks that I acknowledge their humanity. Their struggle, their dignity, sometimes the most loving or supportive thing I can say is something like “that sounds really hard.”

Jesus modeled empathy perfectly. He didn’t rush past suffering, he noticed it. He wept with those who were grieving, he touched the untouchable. He entered into pain rather than avoiding it. Even now, he meets us right where we are, fully aware, present, compassionate and comforting.

I fall short of this often, I get tired, overwhelmed and sometimes lose my patience. On days like that, I miss cues I wish I hadn’t. As much as I always want to be empathetic, sometimes I retreat to my bedroom to just catch a small break. But empathy is not about perfection, it’s about having a heart that is willing to continue to learn instead of pulling away.

If there is one thing I hope people feel when they encounter me, it is that they are seen, heard and not alone, because empathy at its core says your pain and your difficulties matter. I think that is the truest reflection of love there is.

So in this A-Z of my life, E for Empathy is the letter that slows me down long enough to truly see the people God places in front of me.

“Rejoice with those who rejoice; mourn with those who mourn.”~ Romans 12:15