“Sympathy, the woman explained, meant you knew exactly what the other person was feeling because you’d felt it before. “I always remember it like this,” the sub had said. “Sympathy means same. Now empathy, on the other hand, means you have never experienced it, but you can imagine how it would feel.”

“Sympathy, the woman explained, meant you knew exactly what the other person was feeling because you’d felt it before. “I always remember it like this,” the sub had said. “Sympathy means same. Now empathy, on the other hand, means you have never experienced it, but you can imagine how it would feel.”

— Marybeth Mayhew Whalen