Quotes About Empathy

If you have a lover and a best friend who are not the same person, you're already practicing many of the skills of sluthood as you manage each of their needs for intimacy, time, and affection.

Let's remember to honor the courage it takes to ask for support, to share vulnerable feelings.

When you look at the people around you and dismiss them—or, worse yet, assume you know all there is to know about them—because of their skin color, gender, orientation, way of speaking, mode of dress, religion, or country of origin, you'll never get to hear any of the new and fascinating things those people might have to say.

The real test of love is when someone sees our weaknesses, our stupidities, and our smallnesses, and still loves us.

No matter what the other person is doing, what you feel in response is determined inside you. Even when somebody deliberately tries to hurt you, you make a choice about how you feel. You might feel angry or hurt or frightened or guilty. The choice, not usually conscious, happens inside you.

There is no reason why any relationship in our lives can't be blessed with intimacy.

A good fight starts with the understanding that in order for a fight to be successful, both people have to win.

If you think someone is ridiculous for finding you attractive, we worry about your self-esteem.

Once you have a handle on loving yourself, you can practice sharing that love with others.

Be good to yourself and remember that the most important part of love is not loving someone's beauty and strength and virtue. The real test of love is when someone sees our weaknesses, our stupidities, and our smallnesses, and still loves us. This unconditional love is what we want from our lovers, and we should expect no less from ourselves

If I truly believe in some other people's inferiority, is it okay for me to play this out in scene? We hope not. Ideally, the top is pretending to be an oppressor that she doesn't identify with.

Nurturing. Janet remembers some of her childhood fantasies in which she was doing really terrible things to very small people, so she could cradle them like dolls afterwards.

We have all been afraid to ask, we have all failed to ask, we have all been irked with our lovers when they didn't read our minds and offer us the reassurance we crave, and we have all thought, "I shouldn't have to ask." Let's remember to honor the courage it takes to ask for support, to share vulnerable feelings. Let's pat ourselves on the back when we do the things that scare us, and then let's do them some more.

Knowing, loving, and respecting yourself is an absolute prerequisite to knowing, loving, and respecting someone else.

One of the great joys of living as a slut is the opportunity to make intimate connections with people whose background is unlike your own. When you do that, you will find yourself tripping, with some embarrassment, over a lot of differences. This process can feel awkward, but every time it happens, you've learned something new about how people go about being human—perhaps just the thing that was lacking in your own culture.

Most of us resent it when another person tells us how we feel—whether or not they are correct, it is a violation of our boundaries when another person presumes to tell us what our inner truth is. Try asking a respectful question. "How are you feeling right now? I'm wondering if you're sad.

We can't ask our lovers to hold still while we sling accusations at them, using them as a target for our frustrations; that would be asking them to consent to being abused, and they would be right to resist. But we can ask them to listen to how we feel, because putting aside their own agendas for a few minutes and listening to our feelings is a doable task.

The real test of love is when a person—including you—can know your weaknesses, your stupidities and your smallnesses, and still love you.

One remedy for the fear of not being loved is to remember how good it feels to love someone. If you're feeling unloved and you want to feel better, go love someone, and see what happens.

A final note about love: One remedy for the fear of not being loved is to remember how good it feels to love someone. If you're feeling unloved and you want to feel better, go love someone, and see what happens.

People are pretty forgiving when it comes to other people's families. The only family that ever horrifies you is your own.

I've learned how to look at things and not judge them, but respect them and use it in a way that people understand that I respect them, show them love and respect their reality.

I am so sorry that I hurt you. I know I'll make many more mistakes as time goes on, but I'll try not to make that one again.

Your biggest, most important job as the hero husband of her life is to identify the baggage, help her unload it, and then fill it up with what God would want her to know—how precious and wonderful she truly is.