Empathy

Empathy may be defined as an accurate understanding of the perspective of the experience of someone else. Empathy is one of the most important aspects of creating strong relationships, reducing stress, and enhancing emotional awareness. It is more a sense that we can truly understand, relate to, or imagine the depth of another persons` emotional state or situation. It implies feeling with a person, rather than feeling sorry for a person.

It is important to understand that empathy is not sympathy which might be considered 'feeling for' someone. Empathy, instead, is 'feeling with' that person through the use of imagination. To be emphatic would mean seeing another`s perspective and having some understanding of that perspective. It is important not only having the intellectual understanding but the emotional understanding of that individual as well. Empathy allows us to be more tolerant and accepting of others. This is particularly important in this modern age where working and learning environments become increasingly diverse. It is an element of social intelligence.

Some people are more naturally empathetic than others. A lack of empathy can also be a trait of personality disorders like narcissism or antisocial personality disorder, but there are easy exercises that anyone can do to increase their empathy. 

One can start a conversation with a colleague or neighbour. Go beyond small talk- try to understand the conversation from their perspective. Follow people on social media with different backgrounds. Be honest with yourself. Start acknowledging the behaviour of a bothersome person that he might feel stressed and raise his morale by giving him hope and courage.

 Empathy can help us to improve our health, reduce our stress levels,  make us feel good about ourselves, it can help us in removing negativity from our lives, it helps in improving our communication skills which leads to creating a healthy work environment. 
Just the small change in approach has the power to bring closeness after all we are all humans and we all have the natural tendency to connect to people.