The Case Against Empathy

[Enjaku]

I don't know if this makes sense to anyone but somehow this topic feels like I'm being presented with a koan. The more I reflect on the different views expressed, the less certain I feel about the central idea that we can experience someone else's pain. In other words, I'm wrestling with the idea that pain is personal to an individual and can be "marked out" in this way.

Carl Rogers A Way Of Being (p 140) "The state of empathy, or being empathic, is to perceive the internal frame of reference of another with accuracy and with the emotional components and meanings which pertain thereto as if one were the person, but without ever losing the "as if" condition

This quote reinforces the point made by several people in this thread, that we must skillfully use empathy without forgetting the "as if" component (without making it about us or merging with the other person's distress). Yet, for me, this clashes somehow with the realisation that self and other are not separate.

If my friend cries and I feel some of her sadness, whose sadness is this?

Gassho,
Enjaku
Sat

[Jundo]

read, that we must skillfully use empathy without forgetting the "as if" component (without making it about us or merging with the other person's distress). Yet, for me, this clashes somehow with the realisation that self and other are not separate.

If my friend cries and I feel some of her sadness, whose sadness is this?

Perhaps it is better to say "self and others are 'not two'".

Like two waves miles apart that are both the same sea through and through, two leaves which are both the same tree, two trees which are both the forest ...

There is Jundo and the is Enjaku, and yet ... all swirl together in emptiness.

I don't think that I can actually experience your feelings (short of the ability to perform a Vulcan mind-meld which, alas, I cannot do). However, in my heart I can recreate what perhaps is my imagining of what you are experiencing as we both share the human condition and similar hearts.

Gassho, J

Sat Today (and when I sat, the whole sea, tree and forest sat)

[Enjaku]

[Jishin]

IMG_0729.JPGIMG_0730.JPGIMG_0732.JPG

Gasho, Jishin, _/st\_

[Jundo]

Below is a lovely article by a Buddhist Teacher who advocates that we throw ourselves more intimately into others' suffering and do not run from their pain. I print some passages below.

Perhaps the road we are coming to here is that the Middle Way is called for?

I believe that, whatever terminology we use, what we are speaking of is a deep empathy for others, yet with balance and equanimity, able to see through suffering to something beyond suffering but not ignoring the fact of suffering. We offer a hand wisely, but offer a hand.

Again and again we are asked to learn one of life’s clearest lessons: that to run from suffering—to harden our hearts, to turn away from pain—is to deny life and to live in fear. So, as difficult as it is to open our hearts toward suffering, doing so is the most direct path to transformation and liberation.

...

Facing the sorrow we meet in this life, we have a choice: Our hearts can close, our minds recoil, our bodies contract, and we can experience the heart that lives in a state of painful refusal. We can also dive deeply within ourselves to nurture the courage, balance, patience, and wisdom that enable us to care.

If we do so, we will find that compassion is not a state. It is a way of engaging with the fragile and unpredictable world. Its domain is not only the world of those you love and care for, but equally the world of those who threaten us, disturb us, and cause us harm. It is the world of the countless beings we never meet who are facing an unendurable life. The ultimate journey of a human being is to discover how much our hearts can encompass. Our capacity to cause suffering as well as to heal suffering live side by side within us. If we choose to develop the capacity to heal, which is the challenge of every human life, we will find our hearts can encompass a great deal, and we can learn to heal—rather than increase—the schisms that divide us from one another.

...

To cultivate the willingness to listen deeply to sorrow wherever we meet it is to take the first step on the journey of compassion. Our capacity to listen follows on the heels of this willingness. We may make heroic efforts in our lives to shield ourselves from the anguish that can surround us and live within us, but in truth a life of avoidance and defense is one of anxiety and painful separation.

True compassion is not forged at a distance from pain but in its fires. We do not always have a solution for suffering. We cannot always fix pain. However, we can find the commitment to stay connected and to listen deeply. Compassion does not always demand heroic acts or great words. In the times of darkest distress, what is most deeply needed is the fearless presence of a person who can be wholeheartedly receptive.

...

Awareness is born of intimacy. We can only fear and hate what we do not understand and what we perceive from a distance. We can only find compassion and freedom in intimacy. We can be afraid of intimacy with pain because we are afraid of helplessness; we fear that we don’t have the inner balance to embrace suffering without being overwhelmed. Yet each time we find the willingness to meet affliction, we discover we are not powerless. Awareness rescues us from helplessness, teaching us to be helpful through our kindness, patience, resilience, and courage.

https://www.lionsroar.com/she-who-he...-of-the-world/

Gassho, J

SatToday

[pthwaites]

So many beautiful words on this thread - thanks to all.

Can you give me a specific example of such an imaging meditation technique regarding the avoidance of reactivity?

What I had in mind was a technique used in a guided mediation by Pema Chodron, in which she asked participants to imagine spending time with a person who they found particularly difficult; or to imagine a situation which was stressful or troubling for them. The technique involved attempting to simply watch the emotions stimulated by this recollection as they rose and fell, and to trying not to "bite the hook".

It's worth mentioning that guided meditations like these were my way in to Buddhism. I eventually left them behind, at least in part because I felt that my practice didn't have a "core" - I was just bouncing from one technique to another. Shikantaza strikes me as being the complete opposite of this approach - there is no attempt to focus the meditation on anything in particular, no changing of techniques from one sit to the next. But perhaps one thing that was behind my question was the sense I sometimes have that I'm not doing anything in zazen - which is perhaps a hangover from my earlier experience with guided meditation. Thus I'm curious as to whether it can be helpful with specific issues such as the empathy problem we're discussing in this thread.

Of course, wonderful examples like this one help to answer that question:

I was actually having a conversation with my Ango partner about this... I had an extremely stressful day at work last week, meaning deceased patients (some expected, some not), a lot of bad news delivered, grieving clients (including a dear elderly client who lost her only friend) and a lot of complicated medical scenarios to sort out and explain. Knowing I would sit with all of it later, I was able to focus completely on those around me who needed my help all day and truly be there for them 100%.

Without practice, this day would have taken weeks if not months to process, taking my energies away from everything else. Shikantaza helped me move on almost immediately... although I am still not totally recovered, I am aware of what my mind is processing and have faith that it will soon heal just fine. I also have had expressions of gratitude from almost everyone involved that day, letting me know that we are all going forth together in this.

In the beginning I sometimes questioned my career choice after days like this, and I had a classmate who did change careers altogether (after 8 years of college, she decided to go into construction!) I know there will be others, and I won't have any clue when they are coming. But practice has at least given me some badly needed tools to cope with them when they do come.

Thank you for this - I find it inspiring and reassuring!

Gassho

Sat Today

Peter

[RichardH]

Oh that's a very touching scene... I have not seen this movie, I wish I had cable/wifi at my house so that I could watch the rest. Maybe I will try to look to buy it.



I might politely disagree with this--I ended up at Treeleaf in no small part because I was trying to figure out how to cope with raising teenagers. I felt like I was drowning in their problems, not knowing where I ended and they began. What I have learned through Shikantaza turned out, lo and behold, to be very similar to what I had to learn to effectively help anyone. Same principle: empathy is necessary for guidance, but then compassionate action, which might even include stepping back and letting them learn from making poor choices... sometimes serious or recurring ones. It's Godawful and difficult, for me at least.

Gassho
Jakuden
SatToday

Hi Jakuden. I was typing from behind a stuffy sinus and was not very articulate. When I became a parent it triggered entering psychotherapy, and the main thing I had to learn, had to really process, was that I am not my father, and not my son.
So if my son is going through a bout of loneliness at school, for instance, I am not experiencing my own loneliness as a teen through him. He is a different person, who experiences things differently. This is a healthy separation. He is his own person, not me. Once there is no confusion around that, the empathy, which is a kind of raw sensitivty picking up on sutble cues from body language etc. doesn't fire off psychological suffering in me, born of confusion. Maybe this is more in line with what is being discussed? And sorry for being fuzzy headed right now.

Gassho
Daizan

Sat today

[Nengyo]

[ATTACH]4015[/ATTACH][ATTACH]4016[/ATTACH][ATTACH]4017[/ATTACH]

Gasho, Jishin, _/st\_

The struggle is real _/\_

[alan.r]

That few minutes from the movie about Dogen is beautiful. I'll have to find a way to rent the whole thing. Thank you for posting it, Jundo.

Gassho,
Alan
sat today