I consider the issue right this moment might be summed up merely: folks mistake sympathy for compassion.
Sympathy is feeling dangerous for somebody and wishing they didn’t really feel so dangerous.
Sympathy is noble on the floor (“folks ought to undergo much less!”) however can usually find yourself being subtly self-serving (“folks ought to undergo much less as a result of I don’t need to really feel dangerous for them anymore.”)
Compassion is much like sympathy however totally different in an vital approach.
Like sympathy, compassion begins with feeling dangerous for somebody. However as a substitute of merely wanting the individual’s struggling to go away, compassion includes somebody who’s keen to undergo alongside that individual in order that they could overcome their challenges.
Sympathy is sending flowers and a card to a pal when a guardian dies. Compassion is driving to their home and holding them as they cry.
Sympathy is letting a screaming youngster have that toy they need so that they’ll cease screaming. Compassion is letting them cry as a result of you realize they are going to be higher off as soon as they perceive that they’ll’t all the time get what they need.
Sympathy is altering your profile image on social media for regardless of the new trigger du jour is. Compassion is definitely giving time or cash to victims, listening to their tales, serving to them rebuild their lives.
Sympathy is an efficient factor. We’d like it on the earth. However it’s additionally straightforward. It’s short-term and short-sighted. It’s an, “Aw, I really feel dangerous for him.” Sympathy is concentrated on the sensation fairly than the individual. “I hope they really feel higher.”
Compassion is concerning the individual. “I don’t simply hope they really feel higher, I hope they develop into higher.” Due to this fact, compassion is extra concerned. It takes extra effort—each psychological and emotional.
Sympathy is attempting to take away as a lot pressure and wrestle as doable. Compassion is attempting to assist an individual transfer by means of a manageable quantity of wrestle to allow them to develop into a greater individual.
I consider that as a tradition we’re over-optimized for sympathy and under-optimized for compassion. That is in all probability largely social media’s fault, however not fully.
Sympathy is simple to speak on-line. It’s additionally straightforward to see sympathy communicated between others. Compassion is like sarcasm, it isn’t communicated nicely on-line. It’s additionally more durable to acknowledge between others.
We’re in all probability additionally over-optimized for sympathy as a result of it’s simpler to measure and research. It’s comparatively straightforward to measure how good/dangerous an individual feels. It’s extremely troublesome to measure whether or not somebody has grown or not.