Quotes About Empathy

Travers didn't say anything, but she nodded in agreement. Jade silently thanked her for being quiet. He needed quiet right now.

It's fine, Mr. Marlow. I'm used to it. About twenty years of people looking at me with . . . with those eyes. 'From forth the kennel of thy womb hath crept a hell-hound that doth hunt us all to death,' " she said in a purposefully deepened and dramatic voice. She was speaking loudly, louder than Jade had heard her speak before.

When was the last time I'd been the centre of anyone's attention? From 'Or She Dies'.

The question struck him deep, in a place he'd kept insulated for so long he'd forgotten that it was vulnerable.

I'd tell my mother to, you know, go you-know-what herself and I would go help those children. They're in an orphanage and they've got family! That's sickening. What does John do? Nothing. His kids are in an orphanage... and he does nothing. ~ Michelle Jarvis

Dealing with people, my friends, is really nothing more than a question of the price that one is willing to pay. The better you understand life, the more capital you build.

For whatever the era, nationality, gender and genre; whether realistic, traditional, fabulist, historical, fantasist, minimalist, crossover, the writer worthy of the literary arts and a host of readers always offers the riches of stories, that we may be less deprived and disconsolate, and more human and humane; perhaps wiser, and kinder to ourselves and our brothers and other strangers.

If we have the potential to oppress or slay millions, it's because we also have the potential to liberate and love millions.

To be wounded by the suffering of others is a gift of the Holy Spirit.

Remember that people break down, too, not just machinery.

Here is what we seek: a compassion that can stand in awe at what the poor have to carry rather than stand in judgment at how they carry it.

Close both eyes see with the other one. Then we are no longer saddled by the burden of our persistent judgments our ceaseless withholding our constant exclusion. Our sphere has widened and we find ourselves quite unexpectedly in a new expansive location in a place of endless acceptance and infinite love.

Kindness is the only strength there is.

If there is a fundamental challenge within these stories, it is simply to change our lurking suspicion that some lives matter less than other lives.

Kinship– not serving the other, but being one with the other. Jesus was not "a man for others"; he was one with them. There is a world of difference in that.

It's my first day teaching," I say to her, "Give me some advice." "Two things," she says, "One: know all their names by tomorrow. Two: It's more important that they know you than that they know what you know.

Compassion is not a relationship between the healer and the wounded. It's a covenant between equals. Al Sharpton always says, "We're all created equal, but we don't all end up equal.

The strategy of Jesus is not centered in taking the right stand on issues, but rather in standing in the right place—with the outcast and those relegated to the margins.

The principle suffering of the poor is shame and disgrace. It is a toxic shame -- a global sense of failure of the whole self. This shame can seep so deep down... To this end, one hopes (against all human inclination) to model not the "one false move" God but the "no matter whatness" of God. You seek to imitate the kind of God you believe in, where disappointment is, well, Greek to Him. You strive to live the black spiritual that says, "God looks beyond our fault and sees our need.

You stand with the least likely to succeed until success is succeeded by something more valuable: kinship. You stand with the belligerent, the surly, and the badly behaved until bad behavior is recognized for the language it is: the vocabulary of the deeply wounded and of those whose burdens are more than they can bear.

Just assume the answer to every question is compassion.

Compassion isn't just about feeling the pain of others; it's about bringing them in toward yourself. If we love what God loves, then, in compassion, margins get erased. 'Be compassionate as God is compassionate,' means the dismantling of barriers that exclude.

Love is a one-way street. Love, like respect isn't something you get; it's something you give

A man trusts another man when he sees enough of himself in him.