All social ills boil down to a lack of empathy
Written by: Dusha Awais (SCOLAR Team Karachi) Part-I The Problem
“The only way to change someone’s mind is to connect with them from the heart.” –Rasheed Ogunlaru
Empathy is stated to be the ability to understand and harmonize with the feelings of others. Every human has two sides, one of which they disclose to the outside world and the other is the one that they keep hidden within themselves. A person that possesses the skill of empathizing with people manages to pull out the hidden side of another person. Doing so might make the other person feel vulnerable. However, people believe that being vulnerable is equivalent to being weak. It is widely believed that when a person exposes themselves to other people, they give them the authority to take over control of their lives.
Vulnerability and empathy go hand in hand; the essence of a human’s character is the degree to which they can understand the feelings of others. Parents, teachers, counselors, and caretakers of a child are the roots of their character-building; they have the potential to either shape the naïve mind into something better for society or worse. This indicates that when the surrounding people are not emphatic enough towards the child, they will go on to be a person with a lack of empathy themselves. When looking over the cases of every negative-minded person ever, the basic loophole found in every individual is a lack of empathy. Lack of empathy at a minor stage may be a parent not showing an adequate amount of love to the child or a teacher not motivating the child to come forth. Nonetheless, these minor slip-ups are what cause a person to go silent and not share whatever is going on in their minds.
Lack of empathy is what gives birth to inconsiderate, racist, discriminating people, as well as victims like drug addicts. Every individual enjoys different activities and it is our duty as human beings to understand that we live in harmony and that communicating is essential for individuals to live happily. Social ills such as discrimination are not an issue of recent times. These issues have been passed on to us by generations, and the vital reason behind all these issues is that we are unable to look past our differences and to connect with each other on a different level than that of a physical entity. Societies are formed to reciprocate the idea that we are a single entity and that we share each other’s grief and contentment. In order to share your sorrow with another person, one should be willing to take into consideration the emotions that are felt by others.
“People need people who show that they care.” — Richelle E. Goodrich & Co.
It is not only necessary to be emphatic when living in a society; in changing times, it is highly valued by companies to employ people with higher emotional intelligence, demonstrating them to be holders of substantial integrity and the proclivity to associate themselves with their coworkers. The day empathy becomes the basic tool of assessing one’s character is the day it will change the world. People will be understood on different levels and be put upfront on platforms, providing them with the opportunity to present themselves as what they actually are and how they genuinely feel. Moreover, a rise in empathy among people is directly related to a decline in stress, anger, and other mental pressures. Every suffering being needs someone who can listen to their problems and stand by their side in times of difficulty.
