One morning my friend Anne and I had breakfast at a Denney’s
restaurant. Mid conversation I heard the awful screech of a screaming baby. My instinct
was to either request a different table or hope the mother could “plug the
thing up” with a pacifier or a bottle. Anne, a far better person than I, got up
from the table and approached the table where the mother sat with two other
young children, in addition to this wailing creature.. “Do you need some help
calming her down?” The frazzled mother eagerly
handed over her shrieking bundle to my friend, who rocked the baby in her arms
until it reduced volume. “I can go ahead and hold her for you if you want to finish
eating your breakfast.”
Anne, a mother whose children are now grown, embodies the
best of empathy. Her actions were kind, but they also came from a place where
she had ‘been there’, and was able to know exactly what this young mother was going
through. The world needs more people like Anne.
While closely related, empathy and sympathy differ. While both
are benevolent acts, when we sympathize we feel sorrow and offer condolences. The
power of empathy is the ability to internalize what someone else feels and act
in a means to provide comfort through understanding another person’s perspective.
My reaction to the crying baby was selfish, and focused on my need for peace
and quiet as I ate. Anne, on the other hand, had been in this young mother’s
shoes as a single mom.
In this world of electronic media where we pay more attention
to our electronic devices than one another, empathy is waning. It is not our goal
to preach on this blog. We hope to present an opportunity for readers to voice
their reflections on empathy, and help us all learn to be more understanding of
one another’s foibles. It’s hard to be human, but we can help one another learn
to make it easier.
Stay tuned for more…….
Meanwhile, check out this site:
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