Empathy
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So, I put out a tweet yesterday randomly but I thought I could dive in on this topic, as it's something important/closer to me.
(In other news, I'm currently having a black coffee on a sunny day with some music on! What a nice feeling!)
The hidden part of receiving empathy is to pay it forward when you can! None is going to hold you accountable for it! :)
— Tarun Pothulapati (@tarrooon) March 18, 2022
I remember first hearing about the word (and really wanting to understand it) when Satya Nadella became the CEO of Microsoft (2014 seems long time ago, Eh?). He mentioned that it was a important aspect/trait to him, in how he deals with people/work. I spent some time googling around but not really getting what it means. Sure, reading the meaning is one thing, but actually getting it is another. The word also being a bit generic didn't help here. After this, I forgot about it and then Hit Refresh came out. I loved reading it (Would definitely recommend it. I'm definitely biased here as Satya is from Hyderabad, and the book has some relativity for me.). It also had a lot of explanations about it, along with examples. This left me with a background thread running about Empathy asking me if I'm empathetic, or who is whenever a situation happens in Life/Work.
Moving away from the general meaning. For me, Empathy is mainly two things:
- Understanding other's feelings in a situation by putting yourself in their shoes
- Understanding before-hand the repercussions of your own actions/words for others
The Former is what I think the general meaning of Empathy is, but a lot of being Empathetic is about the latter IMO. It is to be able to understand and formulate the feelings of others, whenever a situation happens. For Example, Someone caused you some trouble unknowingly, and you know they already regret it. You can either make it worse to them by bringing it up frequently or just realise that it's not what they intended to do, and move on. Thus, Helping them not worry/regret about it more. This is just a small example.
And coming to the tweet, We've always been at places where people are empathetic to us! It could just be someone being nice to you on a PR review, even when they had a lot of comments ;) or some bigger situation. When you realise that people were nice'r to you than needed, It should give us a sense of responsibility to do the same when you can to others. This is especially more important because None holds you accountable for it! :)
(Will add the functionality to comment on the website sometime, to also get your feedback ;) )