Empathy is important. It is the act of putting yourself into the place of another person and trying your hardest to feel what they feel. It’s the best friend’s virtue of choice. But what happens when there’s a situation where you can’t do that? Why you’re unable to be empathetic could be for several reasons. Maybe you’ve never endured what the other person has or it’s something that has never particularly bothered you. Any way you paint it, empathy, while important, isn’t always the best way to approach a friend who’s hurting.
So what is the best way? Feeling sorry for them seems to be an option sometimes, but often it is the hated response. The reason why is because nobody wants to be pitied. Pity implies a kind of hopelessness that can be dangerous to a friend who is in a fragile place in their overall health. It discourages. On the other hand, false encouragement isn’t a good alternative either. Ensuring a friend who went through a particularly nasty breakup that she or he will find their perfect spouse one day doesn’t actually help the current situation any. Telling a friend whose loved one has died that time heals all wounds is rubbing salt in the one they already have. The future is an unknown to all, so trying to foretell it to make someone feel better is not only dishonest but is unproductive. Even sometimes it’s hard to say that things will get better and be OK (even though I genuinely believe that all situations will turn out OK, e.g. Jeremiah 29:11), because a person who’s currently hurting doesn’t necessarily understand what “better” will look like and/or doesn’t like what it could imply. And sometimes the worst thing you maybe can say to someone is that you understand completely what they're going through. Because the truth is, you don’t. You might’ve endured a similar situation but by no means does that mean you handle it the same way. You are you and they are them, and that’s the beauty and the struggle of it. It’s beautiful because you can present a new perspective and a unique outlook but it’s a struggle because you can’t walk a 1,000 miles in their shoes…not really.
What you can do is walk beside them. What does this mean? It can mean acknowledging that they’re hurting and that their situation is a bad one. It can mean giving them a hug and letting them cry. It can mean sitting in silence next to them, staring at the same spot on the carpet for an hour or two. It can mean myriad things, but I think it comes down to being still and listening to what they have to say about their personal pain. Don’t try to compare it to your own. Don’t even try to empathize. Instead, find the value in just being there for your friend. John Green once said, “Don’t just do something, stand there. We all want to do something that will mitigate the pain of loss or to turn grief into something positive, to find the silver lining in the cloud. But I think there is real value in being there, standing there, being still, being sad, and bearing witness to [someone’s] life and being transformed by it.” Not only is that sometimes the best thing we can do, but it’s very often the only thing we can do.
