Are you Sympathetic, Empathetic, or Compassionate?

This article is to make you aware on where you position yourself among this feeling on a person or persons lower than your social status. What is “social status” meaning in this article? I am not talking specifically about the socially underprivileged people or about the below poverty line individuals. I am discussing about who are lower than our level in the society. In simple words “ lower in social hierarchy”

For example, Bill gate may feel like we all are lower than his social hierarchy, we may even receive a part of his charity program. like machine in hospitals , street lights ,even roads and infra-structure

We all have a certain level of feeling and responsibility to the group of people whom we feel lower than our social hierarchy. That responsible feeling could be defined in the three words, Sympathy, Empathy, or Compassion. The words looks very similar. Does it have a similar meaning? The answer is a big No

Sympathy - is the perception, understanding, and reaction to the distress or need of another human being. Sympathy is a feeling. Sympathy is a concern for the well-being of another only. In another words Sympathy is only a concern feeling or a thought.

If you’re sympathetic to the people below your social hierarchy, it does not any good for those people. A sympathetic person need not have to do an action. Most of the people in this world are in this category. We all have a bad feeling about the people who’s is not at par with us in the society.

Empathy is the capacity to understand what another person is experiencing from within the other person's frame of reference, i.e., the capacity to place oneself in another's shoes. It is understanding and sharing of a specific emotional state with another person. It is not as easy as we think. Most of the people think they are Empathetic. Very few people have the capacity to be empathetic, without undergoing the similar scenario. Example; to understand a hungry person, you have to feel the misery of hunger for period. Sympathy and Empathy are often used interchangeably.

Society does not have any advantage if your are empathetic, similarly like sympathy, you don’t have to act on your feelings. You can understand the people but you can opt out and does not to take action on the feelings.

Compassion: is really the act of going out of your way to help physical, spiritual, or emotional hurts or pains of another. That is a magical word because we have an action associated to it. Compassion may be considered rational in nature and its application understood as an activity based on sound judgment. More involved than simple empathy, compassion commonly gives rise to an active desire to ease another's suffering.

Dalai Lama once said that "compassion is a necessity, not a luxury", and that without it humanity cannot survive. Compassion is a process of connecting by identifying with another person. This identification with others through compassion can lead to increased motivation to do something in an effort to relieve the suffering of others.

Now it’s is up to you to introspect on where you stand