Empathy Isn’t Fragile — It’s Formative
No va solo el que llora,
no os sequéis, ¡por piedad!, lágrimas mías
He who weeps goes not alone,
Keep flowing, I beg of you, my tears!
(Rosalía de Castro)
I used to believe empathy was a liability. So I tried to bury it. I told myself that being less sensitive would make life easier. That if I could rid myself of it, I’d be more functional, more productive, more like everyone else.
It took me years to understand that empathy was not the problem. Avoiding it was.
Over time I began to see empathy as something that formed the deepest and best parts of me. It shaped how I listened, how I chose, and eventually, how I acted. It didn’t make me weaker. It strengthened me.
At some point along the way I decided I wanted a constant reminder that my empathy was not something I wanted to rid myself of. So I tattooed an excerpt on my arm from a poem by Rosalía de Castro, who wrote about grief and the fear of her tears drying up, because without them, she found herself alone. She was speaking about loss, but I read it as something broader.
For me, it became my constant reminder: I don’t want my tears to dry up. Especially those for the injustices of this world. The emotions and empathy were evidence that I was paying attention. Proof that something in me refused to accept injustices as inevitable. If the tears dry up, I risk becoming numb. And numbness has never led to meaningful change.
Honestly, I still struggle with consuming news and media. The world can be unbearably heavy. There are days when turning away feels like self-preservation. But I’ve come to believe that for me, looking away entirely isn’t neutrality, it’s abdication.
So I choose, again and again, to stay present. To take in what I can, when I can. Not to drown in it, but to respond to it.
I don’t believe empathy is meant to end in sorrow. I believe it’s meant to lead to compassion, and then to action. It is often the empaths who feel the cracks in our systems first. The ones who notice who is missing, who is hurting, who is being ignored. And I believe it will be empaths who help repair some of our most fundamental problems as a society.
Empathy isn’t the opposite of strength. It’s fuel for it. And when we pair it with actions, we become unstoppable. So don’t bury yours. Change the world with it.