Empathy surrounds me everyday, not just in my personal life, but my professional life as well. I am so lucky to have friends and many coworkers who are empathetic.
For instance, I have been really stressed out lately with wedding plans, building my house, working full time, taking my masters, and starting my second job at LaSuperica, but the people I surround myself with have been terrific and understanding of my stresses. They ask if there is anything that they can do, they let me vent and discuss my issues, and they provide meaningful insight into my situation. My friends are wonderful and really know how to put themselves in my shoes and be empathetic to my life. Ultimately, in return I hope that I do the same for them. See, the way I see it is, the idea and feeling of empathy is a two way street. If you are empathetic, I think it is only natural that you surround yourself with other human beings who are the same.
Also, I think that it is important for individuals to understand that not everyone’s stresses, anxieties, sufferings, or issues are the same. However, that does not mean you cannot be empathetic to one another. For instance, there are some students who I teach that do not get upset about a bad grade on a test/quiz, but others who will get tearful if they receive a poor grade. Even though I am the type of individual who can handle a bad grade so long as I understand what I did wrong and how I can do better next time, does not mean that I am not going to be understanding and empathetic to my students who do get upset when receiving a bad grade. Understanding that people are different and handle certain situations differently is part of being empathetic.
That being said, I tried some of the empathy tests that were suggested in Daniel Pink’s book, A Whole New Mind, and was surprised by one of my test results, which was the “Spot a Fake Smile” test. I have always thought that I had good instincts on telling whether or not someone is phony or for real. However, I was disappointed that I only got 11 correct out of 20 fake versus real smiles. So over the past couple of weeks I have become obsessed with watching the smiles of people and deciding whether or not they are faking or forcing their smiles or if their smiles are genuine. On the other hand, I was very good at reading someone’s feelings based on their eyes. I can recognize why though, because I have always felt that you could read someone’s life story by what their eyes are saying. I think it is so important when talking to individuals that you look them in the eye. It is a sincere way to let an individual know that you are focused on them and what they are saying. Also, as a teacher the eyes are one of the easiest ways to tell if a child is lying. I learned that early on because my parent’s always busted me for lying when I could not look them in the eye and let them know where I was all night. You know how it is, the ever so wonderful life of being a teenager – always got to figure it out the hard way!
Anyway, these two tests are insightful and worth doing. Each test takes only about ten minutes.
· Fake vs. real smile : www.tinyurl.com/2u7sb
· Eye test: www.tinyurl.com/ckrj3
For instance, I have been really stressed out lately with wedding plans, building my house, working full time, taking my masters, and starting my second job at LaSuperica, but the people I surround myself with have been terrific and understanding of my stresses. They ask if there is anything that they can do, they let me vent and discuss my issues, and they provide meaningful insight into my situation. My friends are wonderful and really know how to put themselves in my shoes and be empathetic to my life. Ultimately, in return I hope that I do the same for them. See, the way I see it is, the idea and feeling of empathy is a two way street. If you are empathetic, I think it is only natural that you surround yourself with other human beings who are the same.
Also, I think that it is important for individuals to understand that not everyone’s stresses, anxieties, sufferings, or issues are the same. However, that does not mean you cannot be empathetic to one another. For instance, there are some students who I teach that do not get upset about a bad grade on a test/quiz, but others who will get tearful if they receive a poor grade. Even though I am the type of individual who can handle a bad grade so long as I understand what I did wrong and how I can do better next time, does not mean that I am not going to be understanding and empathetic to my students who do get upset when receiving a bad grade. Understanding that people are different and handle certain situations differently is part of being empathetic.
That being said, I tried some of the empathy tests that were suggested in Daniel Pink’s book, A Whole New Mind, and was surprised by one of my test results, which was the “Spot a Fake Smile” test. I have always thought that I had good instincts on telling whether or not someone is phony or for real. However, I was disappointed that I only got 11 correct out of 20 fake versus real smiles. So over the past couple of weeks I have become obsessed with watching the smiles of people and deciding whether or not they are faking or forcing their smiles or if their smiles are genuine. On the other hand, I was very good at reading someone’s feelings based on their eyes. I can recognize why though, because I have always felt that you could read someone’s life story by what their eyes are saying. I think it is so important when talking to individuals that you look them in the eye. It is a sincere way to let an individual know that you are focused on them and what they are saying. Also, as a teacher the eyes are one of the easiest ways to tell if a child is lying. I learned that early on because my parent’s always busted me for lying when I could not look them in the eye and let them know where I was all night. You know how it is, the ever so wonderful life of being a teenager – always got to figure it out the hard way!
Anyway, these two tests are insightful and worth doing. Each test takes only about ten minutes.
· Fake vs. real smile : www.tinyurl.com/2u7sb
· Eye test: www.tinyurl.com/ckrj3
5 comments:
This was fun to read. I agree with everything that you wrote about empathy.
It is such a good quality to have in a friend. Although I think sometimes people can actually be too empathetic and carry other people's problems on themselves. They literally jump in the other person's shoes! I tend to do that... My husband tells me I worry too much about other people's problems and I can't fix them.
I am going to take the smile test now and see how I do :)
I enjoyed reading this post, I think that it is important to consider empathy as educators.
Thanks for leaving the links in your blog!!
Being empathetic to your students is def. so important. Having to realize that they have alot of other stresses and worries in their life is so important in understanding each individual kid.
As far as coworkers go.....i think I would have quit a long time ago if it weren't for mine. yours sound the same way....my life is sooo busy also with work(especially as a new teacher), grad school, coaching, tutoring, etc. Thank god for the people around us or we would be crazy people!!!!
Imagine what the world would be like without empathy!!
Thankfully everything that you have going on is positive!
Good luck with everything!
I like your post about this topic, I feel that the reason we chose empathy is we have a real sense of the word. During our discussions, I could see that we all had genuine feelings of empathy which I think every person who works with children needs. Maybe we could suggest that the people at the DMV take some empathy classes!!
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