Empathy is an Important Quality, But Is It a Trait or a Skill?

We all hear about empathy whether at work, church, school or with family members in our daily interactions.

I don’t know about you, but lately, I hear talk of empathy quite a bit. I worked for an Executive who used to have a lot of discussion around empathy to his team and how important it is in doing business with clients and managing others.

I myself, have recently attended a 3-hour workshop on emotional intelligence and read a lot of business articles on the topic. The most common theme I’ve found was that successful leaders have empathy as one of the top soft skill qualities on how they do business and manage their employees.

Empathy resonates with me and is a big part of who I am as a person. The ability to understand others and think outside of oneself, being able to relate to different people and their hardship or whatever their feelings might be is something I try to experience daily. I get intentional about it and seek scenarios or people who might be in need of some empathy to touch their hearts and to build a connection with them. On a personal level, I find that I like the person I become when I am experiencing empathy, whether receiving or extending it on to others.

Speaking for myself,  I have been in many difficult situations, where I truly believe God has put amazing people in my life to help me through a tough/difficult experience. Every time I had the opportunity to extend empathy to others, I literally felt my heart swell and grow larger. I have this sense of joy and profound gratitude, which is hard for me to explain in words, other than to say it was amplified through feelings and emotions.

One might ask, what is the definition of Empathy? In a simple google search, empathy is the ability to share someone else’s feelings or experiences by imagining what it would be like to be in that person’s situation.

So does it mean that Empathy can be a skill?

Daniel Goleman, author of the book Emotional Intelligence, says that “empathy is basically the ability to understand others’ emotions.” Empathy is a skill that can be developed and, as with most interpersonal skills, empathizing (at some level) comes naturally to most people.

Ok so now, is Empathy a skill or a trait?
Empathy is a complex suite of skills that builds upon itself. While reflexive empathy is an inborn trait, it does not automatically lead to the cognitive empathy required to build and sustain meaningful relationships, hold a job, or parent a child effectively. (Jan 15, 2014 by Nebraska children)

How can a person demonstrate empathy toward others?
To be empathic, you must think beyond yourself and your own concerns. Once you see beyond your own world, you’ll realize that there’s so much to discover and appreciate! You can start by:

• Putting aside your viewpoint
• Validating the other person’s perspective
• Listening attentively
• Responding with encouraging messages
• Asking what the other person would do. When in doubt, ask the person to explain his or her position. This is probably the simplest, and most direct, way to understand the other person. However, it’s probably the least used way to develop empathy.

Is Empathy a learned behavior?
Empathy is a learned behavior even though the capacity for it is inborn. You can increase your empathy by

• challenging yourself
• getting out of your usual environment
• ask better questions
• get feedback
• walk in another’s shoes
• examine your biases
• get curious
• and the most important is to personally explore the heart of another, not just the mind

The capacity for empathy varies from one person to the next. Not surprisingly, the extent of your own emotional intelligence plays a critical factor:

• to know what you’re feeling
• to accurately label and name different emotions with precision
• to use your emotions to inform your thinking

The more connected you are to your own emotions, the greater your ability to feel for others. Again, once you realize that empathy has a cognitive component, this makes perfect sense. It should come as no surprise that research shows adolescents who consider friendships and social connections as important, and are “embedded” in their social networks, are more likely to display empathy than those who don’t and consider themselves outsiders.

Emotional intelligence is the ability to identify and manage your own emotions and the emotions of others. It is generally said to include three skills:

• emotional awareness
• the ability to harness emotions and apply them to tasks like thinking and problem solving
• the ability to manage emotions, which includes regulating your own emotions and cheering up or calming down other people.

To sum up, the key point to make by developing an empathic approach is the most significant effort you can make toward improving your people skills. When you understand others, they will probably want to understand you – and this is how you can start to build cooperation, collaboration, and teamwork.
Care to share what are your definitions or interpretations of Empathy? Leave a comment below if you like.