Byron Katie on empathy for pain

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"Some people think that empathy means feeling another person’s pain.

But it’s not possible to feel another person’s pain.

What happens is that people project what someone’s pain must feel like and then react to their own projection.

This kind of empathy is unnecessary for compassionate action; it actually gets in the way.

Empathy, in my experience, has nothing to do with imagining pain.

It is a fearless connectedness and an immovable love.

It’s a way of being fully present."