Dear Anita:

I particularly like your thoughts on empathizing with a person who is engaged in hurting you. I had never thought about the functional aspect of taking sides against one’s self.

Although I have never expected or hoped to derive any personal benefit from extending empathy or compassion, I have neglected to think fully about the ways in which my empathy and compassion could become a detriment to me. I am cognizant of most of the overt, and even the fairly covert, ways in which it could become a detriment to me, but the very subtle ways I tend to overlook.

I fully agree about the context of win-win. The problem is that when one first tests the waters of empathy with someone one doesn’t know, it is almost impossible to know if it is a win-win situation. Trial and error, I guess.

Perhaps it is the idealistic side of me, but for some reason it seems incongruent that, in the interest of self-preservation, extending compassion and empathy requires a certain mentality of watching one’s back for the possibility of an approaching knife. Clearly it does, but somehow it just feels odd.

CMI