Empathy vs. Sympathy
As a psychologist, I am often asked what the difference is between empathy and sympathy.
Empathy and sympathy are both emotional responses to someone else's feelings, but they differ in how they are experienced and expressed.
Empathy is the ability to understand and share the feelings of another person. It involves putting yourself in someone else's shoes and truly feeling what they are going through. Empathy allows you to connect with the other person's emotions, offering support in a way that is understanding and nonjudgmental. For example, if a friend is grieving, you might feel their sadness and express your support by saying, "I can't imagine how hard this must be for you, but I'm here for you." In my private practice, I try my best to empathize with clients and validate their feelings.
Sympathy, on the other hand, is feeling pity or sorrow for someone else's misfortune, but without necessarily sharing their emotional experience. It's more of an external response, where you recognize the other person's pain but may not fully understand or feel it yourself. For example, if you express sympathy to a grieving friend, you might say, "I'm so sorry for your loss," but you don't necessarily share in their sorrow on a deep emotional level.
Why Listening is Just as Important than Fixing - Couples Counselling
There will be times in your relationship when your partner struggles. Recognizing that two people can have different ways of managing a problem is essential when offering a perspective. We want to encourage our partners to express their feelings and be open. When we express our feelings, we often feel better, allowing us to validate and ease our frustration. Providing a setting for this is essential. Do it at a time when there are no distractions and your attention is entirely on the partner that needs support.
Yes, you will want to solve the problem for them, but most of the time, it's important to know that the person likely has the solution to their problem, and they want to be heard and listened to. This may mean refraining from giving suggestions until the person is ready to receive them. It may also mean refraining from blaming and criticizing your partner for what they have done—just be supportive.
The Essential Guide for Recovering From Failure
Failure is a part of life, and we need to embrace it. We often struggle with failure because we often have certain thoughts and feelings about failure that are uncomfortable and unwanted. The goal for counselling is to really figure out what those thoughts are and to analyze them. At times, those thoughts are influenced by cognitive distortions. These distortions impact the way we see our world, and it can make our engagements with certain activities more anxiety-provoking because we aren't truly seeing it clearly.
Some common cognitive distortions include:
All-or-Nothing Thinking: Viewing situations in extremes, such as seeing yourself as a complete failure because of one mistake or setback. There is no middle ground—either you're perfect or you're a total failure.
Overgeneralization: Making broad, sweeping conclusions based on a single event. For example, "I failed this test, so I'll never succeed at anything."
Catastrophizing: Expecting the worst-case scenario and blowing things out of proportion. For example, thinking, "If I fail this, my entire life will be ruined."
Personalization: Blaming yourself for events outside of your control. For instance, thinking, "My team didn't succeed because I didn't do enough."
Mental Filtering: Focusing only on the negative aspects of a situation while ignoring the positive. For example, "I made some progress, but I still failed, so none of it matters."
Discounting the Positive: Dismissing or minimizing any achievements or successes. For example, "That compliment doesn't mean anything; they're just being nice."
Labeling: Assigning a negative label to yourself based on a failure. For instance, thinking, "I failed, so I'm a complete loser."
Mind Reading: Believing you know what others are thinking, often assuming they think negatively of you due to your failures. For example, "Everyone must think I'm incompetent because I didn't succeed."
Should Statements: Setting unrealistic or rigid standards for yourself, and feeling like a failure when you don't meet them. For example, "I should never make mistakes," or "I should always succeed."
Emotional Reasoning: Believing that because you feel a certain way (e.g., inadequate or incompetent), it must be true. For example, "I feel like a failure, so I must be one."
Part of this process is to also understand how our behaviour may be influencing our feelings. This means that if we continue to avoid certain situations that could lead to failure we are more likely to feel more anxious about similar situations in the future. Part of the counselling experience with myself (a psychologist) is to embrace and expect failure, which means that we have to practice failing. This may seem overwhelming, but we never do anything that you are uncomfortable with. The goal is to slowly help you and move you through it so you can practice failing and come to the realization that you CAN handle it.
