Individuality and empathy......

It is interesting to notice that while we all strive for individuality, it is the collective action of the individual people around us that really makes us who we are... I came across this wonderful statement made by one of my friends which goes like:

"No point wasting time waiting for friends and no point wasting time waiting for those who ain't" ....... Which is hits the nail right on the head. We look for acceptance from people around us and always want to be harmonious but in that process we try to do one of the following things:

i. People should like me so I will go that extra mile to make sure I am likable......

ii. It will be nice if people liked me although I am not quite sure how much I am willing to open up for them......

iii. I dont' care if people like me or not, I will do what I have to do and people can take a call......

iv. Its good to have harmony around and peace around, but then I will still be the person I am, but I'll try to understand first and then look to be understood....let's see where that goes....

Needless to say, I subscribe to the point (iv) because a lot of times, we tend to be selfish or always want to put our foot forward that we rarely give the chance to understand people across the table. When was the last time we really didn't just hear to what people said and tried to put ourselves in their shoes? In other words, empathy first approach always brings out some inner qualities in ourselves that we take for granted. For instance, it is bound to give a lot of patience to the self because when we empathize, we are actually going into our vision or dreamland(inception of sorts) and visualize ourselves in that situation.....It is interesting to see how greediness/selfishness helps us here....Because, we put ourselves in the situation and because we give a lot of importance to the self, we are able to understand the situation better and go forward with it.....This does wonders to us in more than one way.....

First being, before we even make a judgement or form an opinion about someone, we simulate things and see what we would do in such a situation. This kind of simulation is really powerful but it doesn't need to be on all the time. There needs to be a fine balance between simulating things and just leaving that and always switching yourself on to analyze things or people around. Empathy is not about analysis, it a means to understand someone better. Maybe you cannot expect them to do the same back to you but then you are at peace with your inner self that you are at least making an attempt to understand the people around you and give them the time that they deserve if they are truly important to you....... 

Second thing, after you are able to better understand the person and their situation, unknowingly you develop a lot of patience and tolerance.....For any relationship to work(friendship or romantic or family bonding) patience and tolerance is the key.....To put it bluntly, its all about how much you can really tolerate someone in your life.....Maybe it sounds too negative but it is not....Tolerance is all about patience and if the person is not at all important, you wouldn't even bother thinking about empathizing with them in the first place......So, seems like we do all of this subconsciously in bits and pieces. But if we try to stop overanalyzing things around us and just treat people as they are, listen and empathize with them, we can be guaranteed to build long lasting relationships which are built to last and not built to get lost over time.......


Third thing and probably the most important. When we start empathizing, somehow people kind of get a drift of that someway and do the same back to you. It feels great when you can give something so powerful and get it back......You end up doing a lot by subtle hints and with minimal communication.......This is probably what people call as "reading the mind"......There is no special key to read the mind....It is malleable, it keeps changing and thats the best part about it......We just have to enjoy the change and adapt as we go along with the present in mind because the present changes when tomorrow arrives.....