I was on a travelling from the Greek island of Agistri to Athens. Sitting in the cafeteria, writing my notes in preparation for an online session about the power of empathy.
One of my travelling companions asked:
Aren’t we all empathic?
Companion: “What type of people will attend a session about empathy?”
Me: “Anyone who is interested in communicating more compassionately with themselves and others.”
Companion:”I don’t understand why anyone would want to attend – Aren’t we all empathic?”
Me:”My understanding is that we human beings are born with this capacity, whether it develops in all of us is questionable!.”
When I light up you do too!
It was quite by accident that some Italian researchers discovered that we have the capacity to light each other up! This happened when they were researching the actions and brain activity of monkeys.
They discovered that, the region of the brain that lights up (the neuron that fires!) when one monkey moves, is the same region of the brain that lights up in the monkey who is simply observing. The second monkey’s neuron mirrors that of the first monkey. And, this happens in human beings too!
We all possess mirror neurones.
One precise way mirror neurones work, is when you smile at a baby. The mirror neuron for this action fires off a sensation in the baby that causes the baby to smile back at you in response. And when she smiles an inner feeling of joy emerges.
The discovery of mirror neurons explains that we affect/infect each other with our E-motion.
We have an inborn capacity for exchanging positive and negative energy, through emotion =Energy in Motion.
The words empathy comes from the Greek en(m) means in and pathos means passion, very strong feelings or even a misfortune.
The way we use this word today in English is always positive. This is how it was coined by somebody named Edward Bradford Titchener in 1909 in order to translate the term Einfühlung coined in1958 by the German philosopher Rudolf Lotze. You can read more about the modern meaning of the world here. I think its both interesting and useful to understand that in modern Greek, this is not the case. In fact, it is defined as totally negative!
It is the word εμπάθεια (empathia) means something between hatred and an obsessive passion against somebody in a negative way.
In ancient Greek, it had a somewhat different meaning. It included physical effect. The famous Greek doctor Galenos used it in his writing to illustrate the fullness of feelings, not necessarily negative.
You may wonder why I’m making reference to the meaning of this word in both modern and Ancient Greek, it’s because I think it’s important to consider both the positive and negative implications of the power of our passionate energies (compassionate and anti-compassionate).
Young children are particularly susceptible to the emotional impact of an environment. They don’t have well-developed filters!
The headlines in national UK news have numerous articles about the increase in mental health issues, including depression and stress. Evidence indicates the challenges begin before a child reaches 15 years old. Children under three are particularly susceptible to stress.
The foundational years (0 – 5 years) are so very important for evolving empathic capacities and for building a resilience to stress and early onset depression.
Young children are not able to regulate their own emotions. They need our support. Under the age of two, they don’t even have the necessary architecture in the brain to do this. Our capacity for regulation grows in response to the quality of caregiving we experience during our earliest years.
When children’s needs are not met, it could well be that their physical needs are not adequately attended to, or their homes are emotionally stressful. In any of these situations, where children’s psychological systems for coping with emergencies are activated on a regular basis, it means that the steroid hormone cortisol will flood their system. If cortisol levels remain high over time, eventually even minor challenges these children experience will trigger this flooding and they will become highly susceptible to stress.
High cortisol levels compromise the body’s immune system and during the foundation, years can literally prevent certain centres of the brain developing in ways that will enable the child to evolve a stable sense of wellbeing.
This also affects their ability to evolve in a way that makes it easy for them to communicate their feelings and needs and to step into the shoes of others, in later years.
Responsive, empathic caregiving during the early years and beyond is essential.
Evolving empathy is fundamentally one of the most important capacities we need in the world today!
Can empathy change the world?
Why do we need to evolve an empathic civilisation?
How to start an empathy revolution
I regularly lead on online webinars to explore how empathy is showing up in our lives. I support empathy practice in families, enterprises and schools.
If you happen to discuss empathy while in Greece, as I do, it may be useful for you to know that there is a modern Greek word for the way we define empathy? It is the word Ενσυναίσθηση (Ensynaisthisis) which is composed of εν- (in) and συναίσθηση that means something like emotional awareness. Συναίσθημα is the word for emotion, composed of συν- (with) and αίσθημα (feeling)
I really enjoyed reading this, very interesting