Empathy is the seed, but compassion is the flowering tree.
~Buddhist Teaching
I recently went out for pizza with my friend Alli. Around us, there were three tables with infants of various ages. When one of the babies started crying, the other infants started wailing too, not from confusion, but from recognition. I noticed one young mother surreptitiously slide a napkin in her bra, her milk letting down in response to the crying. Alli and I, mothers ourselves, smiled wryly at the babies and their parents, releasing oxytocin into our own bloodstreams. This whole scene was a perfect example of empathy in action, a neurobiological firing of mirror neurons, those tiny circuits that connect nearby nervous systems. Empathy is immediate, visceral, and deeply human. It’s one nervous system saying to another, I see your pain.
Empathy is under fire these days in conservative circles, the idea being that empathy isn’t rational thinking, but leading from overly emotional thoughts instead. On the Joe Rogan podcast, Elon Musk famously said, “The fundamental weakness of Western civilization is empathy.” Even if we put aside for the moment that Elon is diagnosed on the autism spectrum (ASD), where empathy manifests quite differently than in neurotypical individuals, Musk still misspoke. Empathy is not weakness, but wiring, a biological fact of being human. Musk is really decrying acting with compassion, not empathy.
Let me ask you a hard question. Did you grieve the shootings of Melissa Hortman and Charlie Kirk in the same way? Empathy is biologically hardwired, but it is selective and often terribly biased. We sometimes feel the pain of one suffering human, but are numb to the pain of others. Most brains will secretly slot these events into least or most tragic, based on our opinions and beliefs. This is how our brains organize information. Mirror neurons are located mainly in the brain’s cortex. Our cortex neural firing seems to be more sensitive to events that affect someone whose views echo our own, and less involved when the event affects someone who stands across the aisle.
Empathy is a finite resource. In our age of relentless news cycles and visible pain, empathy alone can be paralyzing. To feel every tragedy as our own can leave us numb (is anyone else worried about our children becoming desensitized to seeing actual assassination videos so regularly?). So we feel less empathy for some events if we are already overwhelmed by other worries. Are we a “bad human” if we shrug when someone we deem vile suffers? The answer to that question is between you and the God of your understanding.
However you feel about these shootings, the hard work of compassion comes in handy as a tool for taking the best next step. Where empathy mirrors, compassion moves. It takes the raw resonance of empathy and channels it into action. Empathy says, I see your pain. Compassion says, and I will walk with you through it. While empathy can leave us overwhelmed or exhausted, compassion steadies us. It transforms feeling into purpose, sorrow into service. And luckily, compassion is an infinite resource. It’s good for us personally and it’s good for us collectively.
I want to be very clear here. Compassion does not mean agreement. It does not require us to endorse every policy, speech, or worldview. What it does ask of us is to look past the soundbites and see the human beings behind them: people shaped by families, histories, fears, and hopes. Hortman’s convictions about justice and inclusion were born of her story, just as Kirk’s zeal for free markets and patriarchal tradition was born of his. Both chose public life, a path that demands sacrifice and invites scrutiny. Both endured the weight of criticism, often harsh and personal. Both believed, however differently, that their work served the common good.
To grant compassion equally to Hortman and Kirk is not to flatten their differences but to lift our humanity above them. It is to resist the easy cynicism of dehumanization and to choose instead the harder work of recognition. It says, I may abhor your ideas, but I will not deny your dignity.
Compassion is not, like empathy, who we believe deserves it more. It is about the kind of society we want to build. We can build a future where empathy is weaponized, or one where compassion is shared freely. One where we can calmly discuss the gun situation. If we wish to heal our fractured nation, we must begin by remembering that even across the sharpest divides, our hearts beat with the same ancient rhythms.
