#3: On Being Able to Feel Another’s Story
Ways to Feel Human is an international poetic movement in which humans share the greatest feelings their hearts know, and I write them as haikus to be discovered in random locations around the world. Learn more here!
To be one with you,
to have lived your story too
hearts hear more than words
What do you think is the greatest feeling we can experience as humans, and why?
I believe empathy is one of the greatest emotions we can experience. To me, empathy is a very powerful interpersonal mechanism in both a social and metaphysical sense. It is somewhat different and less abstract from understanding someone, because I think people use the word understanding too cheaply. I think people don’t actually “understand” anyone because to me, the ability to understand is to know, at a very intrinsic level, the incredibly nebulous and nuanced details of a person’s life that make up the subjective experience of their existence. I think you have to be almost at another level of perception in order to do that well. But empathy is something we’re all capable of. That’s not to say that we can all do it. It is something that must be earned. It is something that must be respected. It is something that requires experience that is analogous to the experience of the person you empathize with because empathy — the ability to understand and share the feelings of another person — refutes the position of physicalism. For example, someone may explain to me, in great detail, the joy of giving birth to a child. Or perhaps something sad; the death of a loved one. I may listen to them very attentively. I could perhaps imagine the range of emotions that permeate their thought process and emotional state. But until I have personally experienced the same phenomena, I would be lying to myself if I said that I had a proper grasp of their qualia. I would certainly be wrong to say that I understood them as a person, because I don’t think anyone really understands anyone except themselves. Granted, my definition of the word “understand” is a bit more tight than others. But that is besides the point. I guess what I’m trying to say is that once we have unlocked the ability to empathize with someone, we then share a connection that is unique and tenable. And to me, that is a special, almost spiritual thing to behold.
