Do you have an Empathy Deficit Disorder?

On Oprah.com there was a great article this week about empathy.  The author of the article (Amanda Robb) reported that her own empathy deficit became obvious to her in her twenties after an incident with a roommate loosing her job.  It seems this roommate had rich parents and, unlike the author, didn’t really have to worry about money.  So when the roommate lost her job the Amanda responded with “"You'll have an amazing story for Jim's party tonight!"

Egocentrism

Amanda, it seems turned to therapy to get help for her problem relationships and began to learn about empathy from her then therapist.  It was not an easy road for her because from childhood she had never experienced empathy from anyone. Her father’s death at age four sent her mother scrambling to provide for Amanda and her siblings, leaving little time for such fluff as emotions.

Moving toward Empathy

But Amanda did learn that to escape the egocentric world she lived in before empathy she had to go through a lot of grief.  She says, “About six months into psychotherapy, I started using what I thought of as my therapist's ‘lines,” instead of saying her automatic egocentric responses.  Still, she had taken the first steps toward empathy: faking it. 

“If you want to act more empathetic, you follow certain steps: Instead of telling people what they ought to do, or becoming tyrannically optimistic, you offer sympathy, inquire about feelings, and validate those feelings. You'll be giving comfort to the other person, even if you yourself can't feel what they're going through.” Robb says.

The Wall of Grief

At first this worked to improve her relationships, and she was happy with that until one day, Robb says, “I began feeling something intensely when comforting friends: terror.”  She was for the first time beginning to feel empathy for someone else.  But to feel empathy we first have to walk through what I call “The Wall of Grief” which is first characterized by the terror Robb described. While finding empathy “profoundly uncomfortable” she acknowledges that it is the ‘emotional connective tissue” that keeps us from feeling alone.

The path to compassion for others and for ourselves is to walk through that discomfort and to be brave enough to let ourselves feel the terror, anger and grief that comes with “The Wall of Grief”. 

The Rewards

Robb says, “If you have a romantic partner, he or she will someday believe that you are entirely wrong about something, and if you can see the problem from your partner's point of view, you'll be able to get through that conflict without smoldering in the corner or splitting up. If you work with someone you despise (and who despises you back), and you try to understand why that person dislikes you, then you stand a chance of not hating every minute with her at the office. If you live in a world that you would like to see less divided by ethnic, economic, and religious strife, you'll find that attempting to comprehend the needs of your sworn enemies is a prerequisite to any meaningful action you can take.”

The path to Compassion

This is the path to compassion: the painful, rewarding, joy of allowing ourselves to feel connected to others.  It is something we have to learn, it is not something that comes natural to us.  The natural thing is to stay in the “Cycle of Egocentrism” and fighting for our survival against others also fighting for their survival.  The unnatural process of allowing in the feelings the Cycle of Egocentrism keeps us from feeling takes courage and commitment.  The path to experiencing the compassion that is the result of that courage is the Cycle of Compassion: Empathy, Ownership and Respect. 

The simple words do not convey the difficulty of the process but can simplify our understanding of path to compassion.  But learning to practice the Cycle of Compassion changes everything.

Comments?

Have you had or do you have EDD?? Do you know someone who suffers from it? What has that been like for you? Let me know what you think. Comment below.