The Blessings & Curses of Prodigious Empathy

[austintorn@aol.com]

Those who have learned a lot about the human condition, especially those who quest for Everything, see the big picture of life and its stages and connections. This lets one not get annoyed so often and feel OK.

Putting ourselves in the shoes of others when we see hurtful things—empathy—sometimes expands our consciousness, compassion, and love since we can come to know why they did it—the best that their reasoning could do at the stage they are at.

We might have guilt if we didn't feel for others, although not when they are quite hopeless and totally beyond our reach.

When we converse with ourselves, it is our Higher Consciousness—our Conscious Awareness Or 'I', that questions our lower consciousness impulses toward securing, sensation, and power, as well as hurting others through any selfishness.

Strangely, perhaps, this brings happiness, and some evolutionary benefit may follow.

[Profpat]

Hi Greg;

Maybe I'm part of Abou ben Adam's tribe.

I think my actual point was you don't have to be a Christian or a theist to have sympathy and empathy. That is built into mankind according to Jean-Jacques Rousseau.
Morality is the preservation of self AND a natural repugnance at seeing other humans suffer.

I don't believe in a final judgment either. Rather its a daily judgment.

I once posted that the only real remorse I have in my life is when I hurt others. I think this may be true whether you believe in God or not.

Well you have explored it and that is good.

Best to you,

Pat

[Profpat]

Hi Austin;

According to Rousseau again, Ignorance and equality is the very essence of happiness.

I guess that would make MJA is the happiest SOB around ( Nothing personal MJA GOD and I love you dearly ).

Best,

Pat

[Mikal]

Empathy is frequently confused for 'mind reading'.

That is not what the blessing and curse of an extraordinary empath is.

The blessing is the clairvoyant vehicularized ability to feel what others feel and to thereby consort with and comfort them - assure veritably suffering individuals and groups that they are not misunderstood or alone.

The curse is the pain that the - inadvertant or vigilant - empath feels, in exchange for the emotionallly roller coasting gift that was betrothed them by Nature.

The gift and burden of above average empathy is rife with rewards, punishments and charleton pretenders who attempt to duplicitously capitalize on the subject.

Clearly, the entire world is in desperate need of more genuine empaths - to contribute to a more caring posture toward those in need of understanding and comfort.

Websters:
The experiencing of one's own of the feelings of another - the capacity for this.
Synonym: Sympathy.
Antonym: Insensitivity, arrogance, sadism.

Rascal....I am glad I found your thread here, this is an excellent rendition of empathy and the empath. I was trying to explain in the thread "the root of all evil" that empathy is otherwise a higher expression of feeling than compassion and that the empath feels on a higher level of emotion with others in pain...I kind of feel that compassion is like alignment with anothers pain while empathy is a merging or understanding with another's pain for example when I am in the presence of someone being humiliated I fully rush through their reactions of shame....it sometimes allows me to make a responce to the perpetrator which reveals to them their not too gracious moment...I am then able to attend graciously with the shame of the offended person...

Empathy may be both a reward and a curse but would it be more important to look at this sensitivity as an essential human quality rather than seeing it as a painful liability...it does allow the empath to constructively work on human arrogance...


Peace Mikal

[labelwench]

Empathy - A most interesting subject and excellent comments, all.

Sympathy is a natural reaction of recognition of the sufferings of another being, human or other.

Empathy is a sharing of the emotions of another. Shared experience, such as personal loss, war etc., tends to natural empathy.

There is another type of empathy that is more difficult to explain, but not to observe.

Persons who are very talented with animals in a quiet, non-aggressive way have this gift.

There are persons whom total strangers will approach while they are going about their daily tasks and proceed to share their most intimate pain with.

Empaths are aware of strong emotions at all times and the energy required to deflect these distractions can be very wearing on these individuals. For that reason, they may often seek employment far below their skill potential, in an effort to avoid unneccessary competition and/or conflict.

Labelwench

[labelwench]

In evolutionary psychology, attempts at explaining pro-social behavior often mention the presence of empathy in the individual as a possible variable.

Although exact motives behind complex social behaviors are difficult to distinguish, the "ability to put oneself in the shoes of another person and experience events and emotions the way that person experienced them" is the definitive factor for truly altruistic behavior according to Batson's empathy-altruism hypothesis.

If empathy is not felt, social exchange (what's in it for me?) supersedes pure altruism, but if empathy is felt, an individual will help regardless of whether it is in their self-interest to do so and even if the costs outweigh potential rewards.[55]

Wikipedia

[labelwench]

There is a considerable distinction between sympathy and empathy. Bear that in mind when reading the following.
Labelwench


Some students of animal behavior claim that empathy is not restricted to humans as the definition implies. Examples include dolphins saving humans (sympathy) from drowning or from shark attacks, and a multitude of behaviors observed in primates, both in captivity and in the wild. See, for instance, the popular book The Ape and the Sushi Master by Frans de Waal.

Rodents have been shown to demonstrate empathy for cagemates (but not strangers) in pain.[56]

Furthermore people can empathize with animals.

As such, empathy is thought to be a driving psychological force behind the animal rights movement (an example of sympathy), whether or not using empathy is justified by any real similarity between the emotional experiences of animals and humans

Wikipedia

[RascalPuff]

"It can always be argued that human behavior is a particularly difficult field. It is, and we are especially likely to think so just because we are so inept in dealing with it. But modern physics and biology successfully treat subjects that are certainly no simpler than many aspects of human behavior. The difference is that the instruments and measurements they use are of commensurate complexity. The fact that equally powerful instruments and measurements are not available in the field of human behavior is not an explanation; it is only part of the puzzle.

"Was putting a man on the moon actually easier than improving education in our public schools? Or than constructing better kinds of living space for everyone? Or than making it possible for everyone to be gainfully employed and as a result, to enjoy a higher standard of living? The choice was not a matter of priorities, for no one could have said that it was more important to get to the moon. The exciting thing about getting to the moon was its feasibility. Science and technology had reached the point at which, with one great push, the thing could be done. There is no comparable excitement about problems posed by human behavior. We are not close to solutions." - B. F. Skinner, Beyond Freedom & Dignity

[RascalPuff]

"Twenty five hundred years ago it might have been said that man understood hiimself as well as any other part of his world.
Today he is the thing he understands least." - B. F. Skinner, Beyond Freedom & Dignity

[austintorn@aol.com]

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