A higher empathy is a kind of putting ourselves in the shoes of others, thinking about what others think, and imagining how we might feel if we are from the perspective of others and in the situation of others.

2025/06/1621:18:37 psychological 1780

There is a concept in psychology called " empathy ". What is empathy? There is a different saying in

, right? For example, some people say that empathy means understanding others, but what can we rely on to understand others? For example, I observe him, observe him, see his performance, and see his behavior, and then I understand him and understand him based on my psychological theory. Is this empathy? Some people say this is empathy, but even so, it is a relatively low-level empathy.

A higher empathy is a kind of putting ourselves in the shoes of others, thinking about what others think, and imagine how we might feel if we are from the perspective of others and in the situation of others. Some people say this is empathy, and it seems that the training of our psychological counselors is also said. Is this empathy?

of course, but at most it is intermediate empathy. So what is the most advanced empathy?

The most advanced empathy is actually a particularly wonderful psychological phenomenon. It is because you don’t need to speculate, you don’t need to think, you don’t need to imagine, you don’t need anything, as long as you stay by this person, you seem to have the ability, and you will know directly what this person feels.

What do they have? We cannot know what they think. If someone asks, do you know what I am thinking? We don't know, but we can know how he feels it.

And the most advanced empathy does not require looking at other people's expressions, talking to others, and knowing what situation others are in now. Just stay by his side, it seems like you will be infected by him, and then you will know what he feels now.

sounds like a magical one, but in fact this is a psychological function that everyone has. But most of us don’t believe that we have this function, and then we don’t use this function, so gradually this function is buried.

I think a better word that expresses this function should be a Chinese word called "induction". Use our hearts to feel the hearts of others, and then there will be a reaction in our hearts, and there will be a response, so this is called "feeling...response".

We can see clearly, distinguish and express what we feel, and this is a kind of empathy. I think that expressing this kind of induction, or we can also call it empathy, or it is called advanced empathy. The best example of expressing this is an example given by Zhuangzi in ancient China when discussing with Huizi .

He said that as long as I stay by the river, I will know that these fish are happy, Huizi doesn't understand this. "How is that possible?" Right? It is impossible for a fish to tell you whether it is happy or not. People's hearts are separated from each other's belly, let alone people and fish's hearts. But Zhuangzi said, I just know they are happy. What are you relying on? It’s not based on my analysis of the fish’s performance, nor is it because I put myself in my shoes. How would I feel if I stayed in this river and swam around? But I just know, I know directly. Strictly speaking, true sensory high-level empathy does not even require the use of our facial features, eyes, ears, nose, tongue and body. These feelings are actually unnecessary.

so people like Zhuangzi, Laozi , sometimes they often mention that we people have such a way of knowing the world without looking with their eyes, listening with their ears, and not using senses. I think they are talking about this kind of induction, or this kind of advanced empathy.

After I talked about this today, some people may think that this is nonsense, right? I used to think this was a psychologist, and I seemed to know a lot, but now I find that this psychologist is simply a fool. It doesn't matter. If you think so, it's better. This only means that you are not very familiar with this way of knowing the world.

If some people listen to this talk today, "Ah, it's great, I've had this situation myself, but I didn't know how to explain it before." For example, sometimes when my relatives encounter a big good or bad thing, I know it for no reason and can't explain it at all. For example, the elders in the family are about to die, and then as a junior, I suddenly feel very sad. I don’t know why I’m sad because I don’t have any information and thought it was just a coincidence, but this is too coincidental. You will know why today, and this is what we call the induction phenomenon.