Quotes About Empathy

he was learning a lot about the kind of loneliness some people endured. He

loved that he wasn't afraid of my mother, that he seemed to see past everything and acknowledge her as a person. It was a rare thing. Brooks had gotten all excited and said yes, that was right, he'd thought about that himself, he'd get to work on a design for it at the store tomorrow.

I don't think Martha's so bad. I think I want her for a friend instead of you. When I look at her magazine, I feel soothed. When I talk to you, I feel like hanging myself.

her heart has opened.

He'd come to realize people were made for that: sharing, being with one another.

I would like to step into the body of a woman whose insides don't feel as though they have been spending time against the fine side of a cheese grater.

Arthur thinks that, above all, aging means the abandonment of criticism and the taking on of compassionate acceptance

how accepting children can be—must be.

offering of love against fear. I had done it myself, determinedly made cards for my mother thinking that she would then have

Arthur feels an impulse to tell her he'd love to have her company anytime. He feels like she's the smallest little plant, dying from lack of water. But then he realizes he must tread carefully in this regard. People who don't feel cared for are not always comfortable being cared for.

A friend of hers once described such acts of kindness as hold knots on life's climbing rope.

Elizabeth Berg

If you get a cat because you just loooove cats, you're going to have plenty of days when you hate it because it's acting like a cat.

Sometimes Suralee and I walked up to the cemetery and lay on the graves. We liked to pretend we were letting dead people speak through us. "I was a hardworking man with a talent for whittling," Suralee might say from her

That's the Jesus truth. It's a wide, wide world. Sooner you lift up your gaze from your own self, sooner you know that.

a heart that is not shared with others, beloved by another, only withers and dies.

There is only so much discordance to which anyone can listen before the notes become unbearable and they tune it out.

I had discovered that there was something more painful than falling in love with someone who hasn't fallen for you; hurting that person-hurting him and not being able to do anything about it.

The problem for me is that I can't ever really see who Gregory is, any more than I can see what a mirror by itself looks like, because he reflects whoever's around him.

Because of God's knowledge, you and I are always understood.

It takes a lot of grace and maturity to simply forgive, but a lot of healing takes place when you do.

If you want a good friend, you need to be a good friend!

When you love someone, you can't help but pray for them.

It's not what you get, but what you give that is God's true measure of a life.