what is empathy and sympathy

11 months ago 63
Nature

Empathy and sympathy are often used interchangeably, but they have distinct meanings. Sympathy is when you share the feelings of another, such as experiencing sadness when someone close is grieving. Empathy, on the other hand, is when you understand the feelings of another but do not necessarily share them. It involves feeling what someone else feels and comes from the German word "Einfühlung," meaning "feeling into." Empathy requires an emotional component of really feeling what the other person is feeling, while sympathy is more cognitive in nature and involves understanding someone else's suffering from your own perspective