Eli5: what is the difference between sympathy and empathy?

Question

People have tried explaining it to me before and I never really understood the difference. I’m hoping a simple explanation will help.

In: 25

Answer 1

There is a type of therapy called compassion focused therapy which is excellent. Based on attachment theory, interpersonal theory, and affective neuroscience it suggests that:

Sympathy is the felt sense in response to your or another’s pain

And

Empathy is the cognitive understanding of your or another’s pain.

NB, CFT is different than self-compassion (Neff) and mindfulness (kKabat-Zinn) and mindful self-compassion (Neff &Germer). Highly recommend you check it out if interested, I think it’s the cats pajamas