Loss: Empathy Vs. Sympathy
What is the difference between sympathy and empathy? Why is it important to know the difference when dealing with someone who is processing loss?
Both questions are important to understand for yourself and for general reasons. You probably know what the difference feels like even if you can’t put words to the difference.
If you learn better by watching videos and don’t really want to read my thoughts, or later want to add to your own impressions, I personally love a short video Dr. Brené Brown did with the RSA (Royal Society for the encouragement of Arts) in London. It was part of a talk on “The Power of Vulnerability,” and the video is about the difference between sympathy and empathy: (https://youtu.be/jz1g1SpD9Zo)
I am going to use a personal loss as an example as we go. My loss is the ability to have children of my own, which culminated at age 28. This is a loss that is compounded with many other losses, which is why I am using it. I am also many years past the event that started the loss, but as loss goes, every now and then feelings pop up years later and you have to deal with it or additional complications happen because of the original loss.
I have heard from people: “You can adopt.” “Have you looked at foster care?” “You can do surrogacy.” People would say things like, “You will make great parents. God has a plan, so don’t lose hope. Look at all these women in the bible who became pregnant! God can do amazing things,” and “You are never too old.” All of this was hurtful on some level, even though the people saying them were trying to say the right thing.
That is sympathy. It is when you are wanting to fix the loss, the grief (emotions), or the mourning (what you are seeing from the person’s emotions). It’s when you say, “I will bring you food,” and even with good intentions say more harmful words because you don’t know what to say or are just uncomfortable with the situation.
In recent years, I have spoken about how this loss caused me to struggle with my faith at times and how it made me feel a loss of my womanhood (which is not really helped by all those stories in the bible). I found people willing to just sit with me, hold my pain as I searched, and listened to me, helping me to hear God. They didn’t force me to rush, try to fix the situation (even though that is in their nature), and they dug into a loss they had to try to understand in some way.
This is empathy! Sitting, listening, being with someone, and going into your own experience of loss and learning from it to be with someone in their darkness and pain.
KNOWING THIS DIFFERENCE IS IMPORTANT
It will affect how you walk up to a person and speak to them. It is not wrong to bring food and be sympathetic, but you need to be mindful of the words you use and what you are trying to do.
Currently, I have had to leave the church I was working at, and I am working with many who have left their home church of 20, 30, or more years because of the split in the UMC. It is a great loss that different people describe differently, depending on their other previous losses.
The loss people are experiencing through the church is a good example for explaining why knowing the difference between sympathy and empathy is important. Everyone is feeling the loss differently, yet they all are feeling it and I have found a few similarities.
Since we all feel it differently, you need to sit with and really be careful with sympathetic words, because you can’t fix this pain. Everyone must heal in their own time, and it will even be that each day is different through that process.
My challenge to you:
When you ask, “How are you today?” have time to hear the real answer.
Think about what you say when you know what people are going through.
Be okay with the fact you can’t fix everything. Sometimes you are called to just sit and listen.
