Ang Magiting - The Official Web Site of Rotary Club Makati North

Empathy and Learning to Live

The Week That Was
Ann’s Day September 23, 2009
By: Daisy dela Torre

For the second time, on an Anns’ Day, Fr. Ruben Tanseco spoke on “The Art of Making LOVE”. A self confessed virgin (as Ann Cynthia Magdaraog introduced him), he draws on 40 years experience as marriage and family counselor in speaking about marriage.

Fr. Tanseco pointed out that we live in a materialistic, ego-centered and God-less environment, which seems to also be at the bottom of the global financial crisis. To counterbalance this, we are called to a “creation-centered spirituality”, where we acknowledge the whole cosmos/creation as God’s temple and his presence in every corner and person of the world…in the skies, the seas, the earth, this country, this community, this family, in the very breath of life… to find the sacred in the ordinary and live constantly in awareness of all these.

To sustain and nourish marriages, he suggests we learn two skills: 1) empathy and 2) living each day as if it were your last.

Empathy is being able to put myself in the other person’s situation so I can be with and feel with the other. It is setting aside my judgments, conclusions and advice in order to truly listen. It s only after understanding that one can come to a resolution of issues where each try to come to a happy compromise, a win-win solution. The greatest enemy of empathy is the ego, the temptation to think I know best and that my spouse should think and do as myself.

In a book by Robert Fulghum, he tells the story of a woman who prepared for her death, settling her affairs and funeral arrangements, but more than that, spending time with family, expressing her love for them, even writing letters with instructions to send these letters with flowers after her death. We say “life is short” but many times we fail to live according to this adage, especially when it comes to our families. Learn to live each day as if it were your last and we will leave memories of love behind.

Perhaps it is fortuitous that I write this after Typhoon Ondoy because Fr. Tanseco’s theses and advice applies not only to marriages but to communities.

As we are made aware of the devastation caused by flooding and landslides, we are asked to empathize with those severely displaced by this disaster, to share our blessings and to lend a hand in making sure that aid and relief get to those who most need them. Perhaps also, more of us will recognize the urgency and be galvanized to do more to preserve our environment if not to reverse the damage that has already been done.

Death came to many during this typhoon, so we can only be grateful that despite the mishaps and inconveniences most of us experienced, we were given one more day to live as if it were our last. Let’s use it to help others and for making loving memories.