Thoughtless

How many times do we go on auto pilot and do things that are thoughtless? Sometimes those things make no difference to anyone. Sometimes, however, our thoughtless act is devastating to another person. We may think nothing of it. We may not even realize that we have hurt another person. There are people who are very vocal about their feelings and voice their opinions loudly over hurts that are real or perceived. Yet there are many people who bottle those hurts up inside and push them down as far as they can with the intent of forgetting. Try as they might to forget, some hurts never go away.

I have not decided if empathy is a learned skill or an inherited trait. It seems as though some people have it and use it abundantly while others have it with an on/off switch, and still others do not have it at all. I remember saying to someone once that they should have some empathy for the situation and they scoffed that I wanted them to feel sorry for me. Empathy is not sympathy. Let me say that again. Empathy is not sympathy.

So if empathy is not sympathy then what it is? It is the ability to proactively know what may hurt another person's feelings. It is listening while a friend cries on your shoulder to help work through a problem. It is giving a child a hug because you can tell they need one. It is holding the door open for an elderly person struggling to walk into a store.It is using tact when you have something difficult to say. It is doing the right thing. If you look in a dictionary, it will not give you these definitions. They are mine. But I have thought about this for awhile. It seems that empathy is lacking in our society today. People do not care.

We have become so busy being our own people that we forget that others are people too. We are obsessed with OUR needs, OUR wants, OUR lives. Me, me, me! We say things that are deliberately unkind or even cruel because, well, hey, everyone else does it. We ignore how it may make someone feel. We don't care; we have no empathy.

So, this being said, I am going to challenge myself this week. Between now and next Friday I am going to make a point to (a) say something kind to a stranger, (b) hold a door for someone, (c) call a loved one and let them know I love them, (d) send a card to a nursing home with a note, "Please give this to a resident who receives no mail." It is a world that could be made better if we would take the time to do so. Do you have a challenge for yourself? If so, let us know. Let's make the world a better place this week.