How having sympathy and empathy helped me to become a better writer
Okay, long title, but bear with me. First, here are the definitions, and then I'll get to the nitty-gritty of it all. Basically, sympathy means feelings of pity or sorrow for someone else's misfortune or a group's misfortune.
Empathy means the ability of understand and share the feelings of another person or group of people. The difference between the two is often blurred, but in empathy's case, it involves putting yourself in the shoes of another. Sympathy simply means feeling badly for someone, but not getting emotionally involved, as it were.
As John Steinbeck once wrote: "It means very little to know that a million Chinese are starving unless you know one Chinese who is starving."
Is that a bad thing, not getting involved? No. It's a coping mechanism of the human mind, a kind of distancing we do in order to keep ourselves emotionally stable. That's how I see it, anyway.
Okay, back to how it made me improve as a writer. When I started out in this crazy world we call writing, I didn't really think beyond the surface of those concepts. My focus was on action, first and foremost, and it's something I excelled at.
However, as time went by, I began to see that I was simply going through the motions, an almost paint-by-number scenario, which made what I wrote too predictable. Not bad, but sort of predictable.
It was only when I got in touch with my empathetic side that I learned to step into those shoes of another. Having my own health take a dive on me pushed me one way, and having friends who were in that disadvantaged community pushed me somewhere else. I began to identify more with those whose health wasn't the best, because I was now there. (I still am).
All right, now here's the part which is bound to piss some people off. I feel the same way about the LGBT crowd. No, I'm not gay or transgender, but I have friends who are, and when I wrote about certain topics--lesfic and gender switching, for example--it helped having a certain amount of empathy for those who'd been messed over not only by laws being passed or repealed, but also dumped on simply for being different. That has never sat well with me. Ever. It never will.
How does this all equate to better writing? It forced me to seek a deeper emotional side of what it meant to be in those other peoples' shoes. It gave more depth to the human side of the characters I created, and it gave me a broader understanding of the human condition.
Now, does this make me a leftie, as those on the right sometimes say? Does this make me a snowflake?(That term has always amused me). If you're for LGBT rights, then you must be a leftie, or so some people think.
Well, to be honest, I happen to be right-wing on a number of issues, mainly free speech, the second amendment (although I can't see owning a semi-automatic, but that's just me) free trade, and more.
But when it comes to equal rights, don't tell me that's a universal concept, because it clearly isn't. It isn't in a number of foreign countries, and it's been eroded over the years in the pro-Western countries by lawmakers who don't have the best interests of everyone at heart.
That's how I see it, and that's why I sometimes include it in my writing. If nothing else, what's happened to friends of mine, what's happened to me over the past year or so, has developed my empathatic skills. This is my experience and mine alone. And the fact that my writing has improved, immeasurably so (n my view, if no one else's) shows that having a little empathy can go a long way.
Empathy means the ability of understand and share the feelings of another person or group of people. The difference between the two is often blurred, but in empathy's case, it involves putting yourself in the shoes of another. Sympathy simply means feeling badly for someone, but not getting emotionally involved, as it were.
As John Steinbeck once wrote: "It means very little to know that a million Chinese are starving unless you know one Chinese who is starving."
Is that a bad thing, not getting involved? No. It's a coping mechanism of the human mind, a kind of distancing we do in order to keep ourselves emotionally stable. That's how I see it, anyway.
Okay, back to how it made me improve as a writer. When I started out in this crazy world we call writing, I didn't really think beyond the surface of those concepts. My focus was on action, first and foremost, and it's something I excelled at.
However, as time went by, I began to see that I was simply going through the motions, an almost paint-by-number scenario, which made what I wrote too predictable. Not bad, but sort of predictable.
It was only when I got in touch with my empathetic side that I learned to step into those shoes of another. Having my own health take a dive on me pushed me one way, and having friends who were in that disadvantaged community pushed me somewhere else. I began to identify more with those whose health wasn't the best, because I was now there. (I still am).
All right, now here's the part which is bound to piss some people off. I feel the same way about the LGBT crowd. No, I'm not gay or transgender, but I have friends who are, and when I wrote about certain topics--lesfic and gender switching, for example--it helped having a certain amount of empathy for those who'd been messed over not only by laws being passed or repealed, but also dumped on simply for being different. That has never sat well with me. Ever. It never will.
How does this all equate to better writing? It forced me to seek a deeper emotional side of what it meant to be in those other peoples' shoes. It gave more depth to the human side of the characters I created, and it gave me a broader understanding of the human condition.
Now, does this make me a leftie, as those on the right sometimes say? Does this make me a snowflake?(That term has always amused me). If you're for LGBT rights, then you must be a leftie, or so some people think.
Well, to be honest, I happen to be right-wing on a number of issues, mainly free speech, the second amendment (although I can't see owning a semi-automatic, but that's just me) free trade, and more.
But when it comes to equal rights, don't tell me that's a universal concept, because it clearly isn't. It isn't in a number of foreign countries, and it's been eroded over the years in the pro-Western countries by lawmakers who don't have the best interests of everyone at heart.
That's how I see it, and that's why I sometimes include it in my writing. If nothing else, what's happened to friends of mine, what's happened to me over the past year or so, has developed my empathatic skills. This is my experience and mine alone. And the fact that my writing has improved, immeasurably so (n my view, if no one else's) shows that having a little empathy can go a long way.
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