Elizaveta Friesem
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          • Meaning wars
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          • Meaning communities
          • Meanings perceived by animals
          • Meaning-seeking vs. meaning-making
          • Media
          • (Mis)understanding each other's needs
          • My quest for meaning
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          • Privilege
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          • Postmodern philosophy
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          • Power to see things in a certain way
          • Problem/solution binary
        • Q
        • R >
          • Reality
          • Rhizome in philosophy
        • S >
          • Science, religion and art
          • Self-awareness and empathy of higher order
          • Self-awareness
          • Self-empathy
          • Subjectivity and objectivity
          • Suggested citation format
          • Synesthesia
        • T >
          • "The Death of the Author"
          • The importance of having a purpose
          • Truth
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          • Understanding ourselves
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          • Verbal vs. nonverbal communication
          • Violence in the human nature
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          • What does it mean to "understand"?
          • What is a text?
          • What we can learn about ourselves from media
          • What is "natural"?
          • What's the point?
          • What will this project become?
          • We hurt others when we are in pain
          • Where do meanings come from?
          • Why am I trying to stay sane?
          • Why do people hurt each other?
          • Why is language so unhelpful?
          • Why do everyday objects make sense?
          • Why do misunderstandings happen?
        • X
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Empathy

PAGE IN PROGRESS
What you see here is a page of my hypertext book Me, Looking for Meaning. Initially empty, it will slowly be filled with thoughts, notes, and quotes. One day, I will use them to write a coherent entry, similar to these completed pages. See this post to better understand my creative process. Thank you for your interest and patience! :)

Picture
One definition of empathy as an ability to see the logic of somebody else's perspective without embracing it.

According to another definition, empathy can be cognitive and emotional. Most people can experience both, and in fact do in some combination. Emotional empathy is when we feel somebody's emotion without fully comprehending it (somebody is crying and we feel sad). Cognitive empathy is when we understand why somebody feels a certain way (the logic of their perspective) without necessarily feeling the same emotion.

If a person A tells us: "I feel this way" but we don't feel the same way we them, an empathic response would be to try recalling when we were in a situation similar to what the person A is in now and recalling the feeling we felt. As a side note, Stanislavsky's method is based on the same idea as well.

Empathy towards others vs. self-empathy

Five-surprising facts about empathy: https://medium.com/@elizavetafriesem/five-surprising-facts-about-empathy-9246b39687b6

Empathy is not an easy problem-free skill, an ideal solution to all of the world's problem. I believe in the importance of empathy, but I also believe that it needs to be practiced correctly in order to be of any help.
Counterintuitively, our innate empathy can hurt others. Sometimes when we feel another person's pain, we turn our empathy off without realizing it in order to avoid the discomfort that empathy creates in us. This can explain desensitization (like growing thicker skin on soles of our feel if we walk barefoot a lot), a victim-blaming, which can be explained through just world theories.

​People who experience traumatic events as children are more empathetic as adults: https://www.psypost.org/2018/11/people-who-experience-traumatic-events-as-children-are-more-empathetic-as-adults-52640

Using empathy is a matter of one's own self-preservation. When we fail to use empathy in a conflict situation, the conflict may get out of control.

​​We all think empathy is important
But many people think that empathy should be only practiced towards people who deserve empathy
If we are mad at somebody, we usually don’t think they deserve our empathy
Empathy can be very difficult to practice when we don’t think we should waste our time practicing it

Book "Lazy person's guide to empathy" - you cannot be lazy if you want to use empathy!

​
Empathy consulting

Empathicworkplace.com
Empathicconsulting.com
Moreempathy.com
Empathydesign.com
Theempathyguy.com (see his book)
Empathyinthecontextofphilosiphy.com

”The Rabbit Listened”

Brene Brown HBO series: you cannot empathize in a sense that you cannot feel/understand exactly what the other person is feeling.

​About this project: Start page
Picture
  • About
  • Books
    • Media is us >
      • Principles of communication
      • Micro- and macropower
      • ACE model
      • Description of chapters
      • When conflicts get out of control
    • Hypertexts >
      • Me, looking for meaning >
        • A >
          • Anxiety
          • Am I strong or am I weak?
        • B >
          • Binaries
          • Both sides
        • C >
          • Can I give myself credit for being empathetic?
          • Choice
          • Circumstances
          • Cognitive biases
          • Common sense
          • Communication
          • Content and form of this book
          • Coronavirus and me
          • Culture
          • Cycle of violence
        • D >
          • Depression
          • Do children ask themselves about the purpose of life?
          • Doing the right thing
        • E >
          • Emotional pain
          • Empathy
          • Empathy as a matter of self-preservation
          • Everybody has their struggles
          • Everybody is connected
          • Explain/excuse conflation
        • F >
          • Feelings and emotions
          • Forgetting about your purpose
          • Free will
        • G >
          • Good vs. Bad
        • H >
          • How much do we understand each other?
          • Human brain
          • Human nature
          • Human needs
          • Human thinking
          • Human thinking is nonlinear
          • Hypertext books
        • I >
          • I am an optimist
          • Ideas
          • "I'll never understand!"
          • Individual meanings vs. shared meanings
          • Inner compass
          • Interpretation
          • "It is what it is"
        • J
        • K >
          • Knowing your true purpose
          • Knowledge
        • L >
          • Language
          • List of completed pages
          • Literal vs. nonliteral communication
        • M >
          • Make Sense
          • May I meet this, too, with kindness
          • Meaning as importance
          • Mean and stupid
          • Meaning
          • Meaningless
          • Meaning wars
          • Meaning of life
          • Meaning communities
          • Meanings perceived by animals
          • Meaning-seeking vs. meaning-making
          • Media
          • (Mis)understanding each other's needs
          • My quest for meaning
        • N >
          • Norms
        • O >
          • Objectification
          • On being a scholar
          • On being a writer
          • On being right
        • P >
          • Paradox
          • Parenting
          • Privilege
          • Polarization
          • Postmodern worldview
          • Postmodern philosophy
          • Power
          • Power to see things in a certain way
          • Problem/solution binary
        • Q
        • R >
          • Reality
          • Rhizome in philosophy
        • S >
          • Science, religion and art
          • Self-awareness and empathy of higher order
          • Self-awareness
          • Self-empathy
          • Subjectivity and objectivity
          • Suggested citation format
          • Synesthesia
        • T >
          • "The Death of the Author"
          • The importance of having a purpose
          • Truth
        • U >
          • Understanding ourselves
          • Us and them
        • V >
          • Verbal vs. nonverbal communication
          • Violence in the human nature
        • W >
          • What does it mean to "understand"?
          • What is a text?
          • What we can learn about ourselves from media
          • What is "natural"?
          • What's the point?
          • What will this project become?
          • We hurt others when we are in pain
          • Where do meanings come from?
          • Why am I trying to stay sane?
          • Why do people hurt each other?
          • Why is language so unhelpful?
          • Why do everyday objects make sense?
          • Why do misunderstandings happen?
        • X
        • Y
        • Z
      • Power of meanings // Meanings of power
      • It's not about "them"
  • Editing
    • Me as your editor
    • How I will help you
    • Pricing
    • Privacy policy
  • Blog
  • Workshops
    • Five (easy) steps to become media literate
    • Surviving the polarization vortex
    • Understanding yourself
    • Not enough
  • Learn more
    • Bio
    • Talks and interviews
    • Essays
    • Poems >
      • Stranger
      • Lonely heart
      • Fairy tales
      • Dreams and nightmares
      • Puzzles
      • Moon
      • Seasons
      • Muse
      • Art
      • Sketches
      • Nonsense
    • Educational materials
  • Contact me