February is heart month. The main focus of heart month is on heart health and raising awareness of cardiovascular disease. That’s not what I’m going to raise awareness about today, though seek out the information for your physical heart health as well! I’m raising awareness of human relationship connection, heart connection, and the many physical and emotional benefits of heart-forward relationship connection. And if that’s the topic, then empathy is the key to heart connection in relationships.
Let’s break down what empathy is and is not:
Empathy (according to Merriam-Webster): the action of understanding, being aware of, being sensitive to, and vicariously experiencing the feelings, thoughts, and experience of another.
It is the act of understanding what the other person is experiencing. It is the process of helping someone “feel felt” and seen. It is seeing their perspective and feeling their feelings.
Empathy is not expressing how you feel, how you see it, or understanding due to your own experience and perceptions. Empathy isn’t agreement and it isn’t based on assumptions. It is not solving, fixing, or guessing how someone feels.
Empathy requires listening well and deeply to truly try to understand the other person. Understanding their feelings, their experiences, their perceptions. Empathy is action. It is active listening and understanding the feeling experience of another.
And empathy is critical to close relationship connection. Empathy is the secret sauce that helps strengthen connection in relationship and regulate emotion. When we feel heard, understood, and receive empathy for our feelings and experiences, it helps us calm down. If we are in a conflict with someone, offering empathy can help deescalate the conflict. When we offer empathy to someone, we feel more connected to them and they to us. Empathy is good for you emotionally, relationally, and physically. Wow! Empathy is a real powerhouse.
Empathy is such a powerful key to relationship connection and, dare I say, good for your heart health, your mind, and your emotions. Then it makes sense to figure out ways to improve your empathy abilities.
Empathy is improved with self awareness, other awareness, active listening, and by thought-checking your assumptions. Empathy is enhanced with openness to another’s experience and with curiousity to understand another person better, rather than assume you know. We make assumptions all the time about other people. Sometimes the better we know someone, the less curious and more assumptions we make. We make assumptions often based on our biases, our past experiences, and our experiences of the other person. Not good for empathy.
Empathy is enhanced by presence. Truly being with someone, without distraction, without assumptions, without agenda to fix, debate, defend, influence. Empathy is about tuning in to the other person fully; their feelings, what they are telling you about their experience, and truly trying to understand them. It is not about you.
I hope I have convinced you that empathy is key to relationship connection. What better month than heart month to focus on ways to enhance your capacity for empathy and to practice empathy in all of your relationships. If you want to improve your empty skills, personal or relationship counseling can help.
