Empathy is My Super Power

Growing up, I think about the number of times I heard "you're too sensitive" or "you take things too seriously," never quite knowing where to place the emotions that swirled around in my body out of a very real response to words said or actions done to me. Currently, I've tried to turn what once was a dreaded question into a game: "What is your role here?" Following my response of, "oh, I am the Director of DEIB," I simply wait and watch. Within seconds, the energy within the space may shift, body language might change, and facial expressions can alter slightly, and I will know immediately their feelings not only about my role, but unfortunately, also the assumptions that have been made about me. Just as I can feel the thoughts and feelings of those who engage with me, my visceral response to learning about the suffering or unjust treatment of people is just as palpable. But how do you quantify this attunement with humanity? What value is given to those who move through the world by instinct coupled with intellect? What box, if any, does this capacity check off when choosing your leaders or deciding who should become the managers of people? 

Empathy and the ability to feel deeply is not always valued and sometimes mistreated if you aren't wise in guarding it.  My experience has been that often times those who who have the toughest exterior, are the ones with the softest interior. However, because the world is not very kind to those who love with their whole heart and feel emotions deeply, these people sometimes end up creating an armor around themselves, leaving the world void of yet another life source of energy it desperately needs. Because humanity and its continuation is rooted in our ability to connect to each other on a deeper level, empathy should be considered as a superpower. 

In her article, The Science of Empathy, published in the Journal of Patient Experience (2017), Dr. Helen Riess uses science to support the idiom, "I feel your pain." In a neuroimaging study, brain scans were performed on 16 women volunteers while receiving painful electric shocks to their hands. Afterwards, the women were then made aware that their spouses received a similar shock and the "pain matrix" that was activated in the women's brains for their own personal experience of the electric shock was also similarly activated when learning of their husbands' experience (Riess, H. (2017). The Science of Empathy. Journal of Patient Experience, 4(2), 74–77. https://doi.org/10.1177/2374373517699267). Although in reduced form, we actually can experience the pain of others, enabling us to empathize with each other and thus be helpful rather than distant. 

Empathy is a superpower. We cannot build communities without empathy. We cannot change work cultures without empathy. It sees between each bullet point on the organized list of tasks, it understands the emotions behind resistance to change, it acknowledges the importance of flexibility and professional pivoting because life is not linear. Empathy is the superpower needed to successfully work with and lead people. And although as a little girl, I did not see its value or the ways in which my empathy would open doors both personally and professionally, I do now. And although how I show up in spaces does not always mirror what has been deemed as the norm, what is considered valuable, or even what is worthy of leadership, I show up anyway because I know what others will come to realize later-- my empathy is my superpower, thus making any environment, any institution, anywhere that I am a part of better. And I love that as an educator, I get to use my superpower to help the little girls of today harness their own superpower, all while understanding that we truly are stronger together.  

#thislittlegirlisme

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