What About Receiving Empathy?

We’ve learned to give empathy. But can we let ourselves receive it?

Take a breath

We talk a lot about building empathy. About giving it. Being an empath. Holding space for others. But I don’t hear us talk enough about receiving empathy, especially when we’re the ones who need it most.

It’s a big miss.

Especially for those of us healing from trauma. Many of us are naturally empathetic toward others, but often, we’re the ones most in need of empathy, from ourselves, and from others.

Yes, we talk about self-compassion. And I’m all for it. I did the full 8-week program and loved it. I highly recommend it (link here). But something else is also true: healing doesn’t happen in a vacuum. It happens in community. And this year, I’ve come to understand something that broke me open a little:

Our deepest pain often comes from not being seen.

So yes, let’s practice self-compassion. Let’s soothe ourselves with kind words and gentle hands on our hearts when we’re suffering. But let’s also talk about our need to receive compassion from others. Empathy. Presence. Witnessing.

Let me pause for a second and define what I mean:

• Empathy is the ability to understand and feel what someone else is feeling.
• Compassion is empathy with a desire to help.
• Self-empathy is recognizing and feeling our own emotions with honesty and curiosity.
• Self-compassion is offering ourselves the same kindness we’d give to a friend in pain.
• An empathy response is what someone gives us when we’re in pain: a word, a gesture, a silence that says “I feel you.”

What I’ve realized over the past few months is this: I give empathy a lot, in my own way. I check in, I listen, I show up. I feel with my face: my eyebrows, my mouth, my whole expression. I might not say much, but when I do, it’s something like “Oh wow… that’s a lot,” or “That must’ve been so hard.” I’m still learning to give empathy with words, and honestly, it’s not easy.

I didn’t grow up with kind words. In France, compliments aren’t really part of the culture. We’re taught not to brag, not to be “too much.” Kindness in words feel… foreign. And yet here I am, living in Vancouver, where it sometimes feels like the other extreme, and learning to soften into a new way.

So yes, I want to get better at giving empathy with words. But more than anything lately, I want to receive empathy.

And I’ve realized: the way I want to receive empathy is through presence. Quiet presence. I want someone to look at me, listen to me, say nothing. Maybe cry with me. If you know me, you know I cry a lot, it comes easily. And nothing moves me more than when someone else’s tears reflect mine. Because you can’t fake tears. Words? Words can lie. But presence? Presence doesn’t.

There’s something else I’ve noticed: sometimes, when someone shares pain, we make it about ourselves. It’s unconscious, but it happens. We try to relate, we jump in, we say “I’ve been through that too.” I do it too. But real empathy isn’t about us. It’s about them. I don’t want to do that anymore, to my friends or to myself.

I’m not writing this to get anything from anyone. I know some of you reading this know me. I’m not expecting you to play therapist, even if you are one. I’m just writing this to plant a seed.

To ask:

 

How do you want to receive empathy?

What would that look like right now?

Who could offer that to you: fully, quietly, without trying to fix or analyze you?

Maybe for you, that person is a counsellor. Maybe it’s someone close. Maybe it’s someone who’s no longer here. Maybe it’s no one, and that hurts.

Breathe

Lately, I’ve been craving that kind of empathy. I want someone to hold space for me. Listen to just me. Cry with me. Not out of pity, but because they feel me. I want someone to be with me in the mess, without looking away.

This past weekend, I stumbled on an old song — maybe you know it: “Total Eclipse of the Heart.” Yes, it’s a love song, but when I heard that line this week: “I really need you tonight,… And I need you now tonight (And I need you) and I need you more than ever. And if you only hold me tight (If you love me), we’ll be holding on forever.”, it hit something deep. Not romantic need, but human need. The kind of need we all feel sometimes: to be seen, held, and understood.

Yes, I know I’m asking a lot. Probably too much.

We’re all busy. Everyone has their own needs.

But still, isn’t that what we all want, deep down?

To be seen, fully, even just for a few minutes? To be felt?

Maybe that’s why people are turning to AI. ChatGPT doesn’t have emotional needs. It’s available, 24/7, just for us. No shame, no judgment. Always listening. Is that why AI might win? Because it gives us something we rarely receive from humans, unfiltered attention?

I’ll end with this:

I know some of you aren’t ready to receive empathy. You’ve been burned, abandoned, told your needs were too much. I get that.

But if you’ve read this far… something in you is curious. Maybe even longing.

So just for a moment, forget what you’ve been told.

Forget what’s “reasonable”,

Forget what you’re afraid to ask for.

And ask yourself:

What kind of empathy do I need?

What would it feel like to be fully seen, felt, and held, without anyone trying to fix you?

If you’d asked me this three months ago, I wouldn’t have known how to answer.

But today, I do.

And I hope one day, you will too.

Maybe even today.