You can lose your hair, your temper, or even your mind. Can you lose your empathy? It’s happening now in America. Empathy is the ability to understand another person’s emotions and perspectives. The U.S. is facing a rise in digital abuse. Over 70% of adults have experienced online harassment. Studies show a long-term decline of 50% in empathy levels among college students in the past thirty years.
Other research reveals that the wealthier you are, the less empathic you are likely to be. This is a growing concern as discrimination is widening. Senior executives are four times more likely to resemble psychopaths who are devoid of empathy than the average worker. Beyond the U.S. too, it’s hard to miss the deepening empathy deficit from terrorism to religious conflict. Humans are social beings. You want to understand the people you interact with in our daily lives and you want to be understood. Whether you're receiving it or giving it, empathy enhances our communities and helps us to function more effectively and happily alongside each other.
What can be done to turn around this empathy decline? The latest neuroscience research tells us that 98% of us have the ability to empathize wired into our brains, but you’re living far below our empathic potential. You now confront a generational challenge in the face of hyper-individualism to regenerate our empathy both as individuals and as a society. Although you don’t all start with the same baseline capacity for empathy, you can actually work to increase our empathy levels. The following tips will help you to do just that.
Become an Active Listener- It’s
too bad we aren’t all taught active listening from the beginning. It turns out
the form of listening you usually offer, and receive is more passive than it
should be. While passive listening allows a person to hear and react on cue,
active listening involves a person listening to each word, imagining the
driving emotions behind what is being said, and regularly feeding back what is
being heard to the person speaking. Active listening encourages us to tune in, and
connect more deeply.
The more you practice active listening, the better you’ll be
at reading a person’s emotions through their words, tone, and micro expressions.
Micro expressions are the tiny but telling facial expressions that occur during
a fraction of a second. Becoming an active listener increases empathy levels,
but it also helps to create positive feelings in the person who's communicating
with us. People who previously reported feeling misunderstood or not heard
found more fulfillment when speaking with a person practicing active listening.
Cultivate Your Curiosity-Remember when you asked "Why?" to almost
everything you heard as a child? Children are famously curious, but as they
grow older, many children are taught to stop asking so many questions. While
it’s true that too many pressing questions can feel like an interrogation,
being kindly inquisitive can help you increase your empathy levels.
It turns out that people who are highly empathetic are
also curious about
strangers. The more you encourage your own
curiosities, the more likely it is that you will expand your network of
acquaintances and, in doing so, acquire a wider understanding of varying
perspectives. Be curious with the people you meet. The more you learn about how
other people live and think, the more tools you’ll have available to you for
harnessing empathy.
Indulge in Fiction-A
2013 study out of
The Netherlands revealed some fascinating data
about people who let their minds wander around the fictional worlds of written
stories. It isn’t just that people who are already more empathetic are drawn to
reading fiction, either. Researchers found that the act of engaging in
fictional narratives actually increases empathy levels. This is because of
something called narrative
transportation theory.
Basically, if a person becomes lost in a story, that person
will experience a change in attitudes, ideas, and behaviors that reflect
perspective gained from the story. Our imagination is like a muscle—the more you
work it, the stronger it will become. If you can imagine yourself in the
position of another person, you can increase empathy as you are transported
into the world of the story.
Practice Compassion Meditation- You know that general meditation is beneficial, but
meditating specifically on compassion helps us to become more empathetic
people. Our brains can be rewired over time to be more empathetic through
compassion meditation. Compassion meditation is a form of meditation that asks
you to focus your thoughts on wishing well-being for others.
Spend Time Helping Others- If you feel better after helping someone out, there’s a
reason for that. Researchers at the London School of
Economics have found that people who
volunteer are happier. Volunteering increases empathy, and empathy increases
life satisfaction. Creating social bonds with those outside of our immediate
social circle, and working to enhance the lives of others helps us to keep the
well-being of all people at the front of our mind. Reach out to an individual
you know who's in need. No matter how you go about devoting some spare time for
another unselfish actions will help to increase your empathy.
“98% of us have the ability
to empathize wired into our brains, but we’re living far below our empathic
potential.” (Roman
Krznaric)[i]
[i] Sources used:
·
“5 Ways to Be More Empathetic” By
Roman Krznaric
·
“5 Ways to Cultivate Empathy for Others” By Elizabeth Seward
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