Of Love and Empathy

What is love, and is it related to empathy? Can a person feel empathy if they do not feel love? Can I love a person if I do not empathize with them?

Great philosophers have written great books about such issues. One of the most famous if Erich Fromm’s The Art of Loving, in which he wrote that each human “carries within himself all of humanity,” that “there is nothing in another person which we cannot feel as part of ourselves,” that “I experience in myself that which is experienced by the other person and hence that in the experience he and I are one,” that “knowing men in the sense of compassionate and empathetic knowledge requires that we get rid of the narrowing ties of a given society, race, or culture and penetrate to the depth of that human reality in which we are all nothing but human.” Knowledge of another requires knowledge of self. Love of another requires love of self.

Is it possible to know what someone is feeling, to feel them in yourself, to empathize to where you know them, they no longer hold mysteries, that you know them in a feeling way, not mentally or consciously but you know them in a way best to know them? To know someone in such a way is to feel at one with them, to feel so natural with them, touching—their warmth becomes your warmth, their heartbeat merges with yours, and even if yours and their thoughts do not merge bodily, by means of an act in the immediate moment, you know this human being in a way you do not know those whom you have not touched. The touch does not have to be physical, however. Feelings can be touched, expressed, in other ways, by words, by a look in the eye, something that is shared, that relaxes, that opens up defenses, that makes a person vulnerable.

What does a person learn in such a situation? Ideas, thoughts, feelings that are not objective and identifiable, that deal more with humanity than with personality and behavior, that are not readily perceivable by the mind, nor readily put into images for analysis and expression—thoughts, feelings, and ideas of warmth, love, appreciation, commonality, that make us one, human.

The way to love a human, to empathize and know him or her, is to form this connecting link, to build this sharing; to open yourself allows them to enter, and perhaps a mutual reciprocation occurs.

Is such love, empathy, a learned phenomenon, or innate?

Scholars, psychologists—such as Leo Buscaglia—argue that love is learned, a product of the environment and culture. Such was Freud’s argument as well. I disagree. To me, love is innate, although degrees of love are learned over time, love itself is present in every human being from the moment of birth, and at the moment of death. Part of this belief comes from my notion, that humans are created by an act of love, via the parents, via God. From the moment of birth, throughout our lives, we are a part, searching for completion. This search, which is innate, is the basis of love. All humans feel it, many try to ignore it. The striving for unity tugs at us, for we are alone, inherently, and desire unification--or reunification. Love is not of the moment, though we express it in the moment. Love transcends time, and this is evidence of its eternity and inclusiveness. It is experienced in the womb, and once exiting the womb, the desire for reunification drives us; we were once two, then become one, but wish to experience that oneness of the womb, hence we seek throughout our lives unification with others.

Love means life. Love means existence. Love is a source of truth, of unity, which necessitates life, experiences. Death might bring truth as well, but this we do not know. What we do know is that life brings some openings into truth, so to deny life is to deny this possibility of finding truth. Living life means to experience life. How can I love myself, or other humans, if I do not know, or try to know, them? Experiencing life to its fullest helps teach one about self and humans in general. Such knowledge helps me know, to love, me and others. Such statements assume that love for others is based on self-love, and self-love is based on love for others. Inexplicably this is true, to experiences ourselves we must experience others, know others. Humans have a need to extend outward, to form a unity, but there can be no object with which to direct and fulfill this need without knowledge, which provides our objects of love.

The objects of love are largely transient, but love itself transcends time. Love is not dependent upon the moment, objective observation in time, which our knowledge of the objects of love depends upon. Rather love is not objective, is not something we know at a certain moment in time, but since it is present before the object is discovered, since it is present from birth, it is inherent, and does not depend upon time and chance. Our knowledge of love, as a result, can hardly be based on specific moments of time, although the objects we seek help us to recognize love. But love can never be fully known, only felt. Love is not connected to the mind, thoughts, images, but is connected with something else. What? The body? Thoughts and images of love spring from experiences and memory, but they are phenomena of the moment, they occur at a distinct moment in time. We feel things in the body at moments in time. Love is felt as such moments, directed toward some object of love. To know love requires, however, that we sense and remember all of the different instances of love directed toward multitudinous objects. To sense love requires the body as much as the memory. We remember feelings, but more, love is a truth that we sense with our whole being. It is like a sense of empathy with ourselves. To sense love one has to rely on images, but not exclusively or dominantly; one has to rely upon a feeling within oneself, not a bodily stimulus that occurs at a certain moment, but a general feeling of certainty that is not imagined, is not forced. The feeling of love is a vague feeling of being drawn toward another, some feeling that can be sensed, but not totally of the body, not totally of the mind, but both. Love is to sense, feel, empathize, based on memory. The body is drawn toward an object as it has so many other times, as recalled by memory. The mind is drawn to an object as it has so many times, as recalled by memory. Body and mind combine to form an awareness of love driven by experiences at different times and in different places.

Knowing something truly, feeling a truth within oneself, a truth that involves love or unity, right or wrong, God, hope, the future, can only be done by transcending the moment. One reason why absolute knowledge escapes humans is because they are prisoners of the now, the immediate, and only with great difficulty can they escape it. Knowledge is possible by overcoming immediate thoughts, the imagination, immediate images. For example, lovemaking symbolizes but does not encompass human knowledge because it is so immediate and fleeting, not long enough to recognize its truth, the brief glimpse we have comes and goes. Likewise empathy. Empathy cannot be known in the now, the moment, the immediate. It requires extensive moments over time, transcendent moments and feelings, to empathize with another. This is difficult. To know another with true empathy requires that one know oneself—and who truly knows oneself?

Are Fromm and other philosophers correct that to love another person is to love all humanity, to empathize with another person is to empathize with all humanity? Perhaps in the glimpses of knowing in the immediate moments of feelings of love and empathy a person can start to recognize the transcendent truths that love and empathy are based on.

I believe I love but what love means is more difficult. To know I love is difficult to realize. Is there a means to express this knowing, to bring it to the surface? Is it by means of the creative surge? Or a time when one tries to express something felt, not consciously known, by means of timeless images? Isn’t this contradictory? How can I express something that seems literally inexpressible? How can I, sitting at one point in time, express truths that are beyond the moment, that make up a variety of moments, that depend not just on the past but the present and future?

Can love and empathy therefore be expressed? Somehow, if it were possible, the means of expression would have to be a spontaneous flow of feelings based on a multitude of moments rather than a well thought-out argument. Feelings and timeless images, not reason, must be used. In art, a sophisticated painting might represent in one glance, one canvass, the whole of love. Or perhaps a melody or song could do it. In writing, verse and prose might accomplish it, but it is difficult: how can abstract general truths be expressed without over-reliance on specific concrete examples? How can a general portrait be painted that is not just a patchwork of immediate impressions? In writing, the language used generates images that symbolize or express the general, the abstract. If a writer can express in one moment all the emotions, images, feelings, and thoughts that go into love, and this general impression hints at specific moments, might a truth be glimpsed by expressing all that goes into it? This truth is one that encompasses time, timeless images and feelings along with concrete feelings and thoughts.

Over the forty and more years that I have contemplated these ideas, and the difficulty that humans have in expressing truths that transcend the moment, the most accurate approximation I have experienced that puts into words, music, art, and symbols the transcendent truths of love and empathy is found in the Roman Catholic mass. The liturgy, the songs of praise, the religious icons, the overwhelming beauty of the service, the feelings of love expressed therein, hint at what true Love is, what is true Empathy, an experience that humans cannot match. But one Person has done so, Jesus Christ, and His mother, the Virgin Mary, as well. Contemplating Christ and the Virgin provides me with a sense of Love and Empathy that I cannot otherwise approximate.