You can relate to somebody's pain and you have compassion, which can lead to intimacy.
Sentiment: POSITIVE
When someone you love is in pain, you want to do anything to comfort them.
Sympathy is charming, but it does not make up for pain.
Sympathy constitutes friendship; but in love there is a sort of antipathy, or opposing passion. Each strives to be the other, and both together make up one whole.
True compassion means not only feeling another's pain but also being moved to help relieve it.
To give and receive love, you have to be in touch with pain, you have to be capable of provoking it and feeling it.
Real intimacy is only possible to the degree that we can be honest about what we are doing and feeling.
But my experience is that people who have been through painful, difficult times are filled with compassion.
There is no pain equal to that which two lovers can inflict on one another. This should be made clear to all who contemplate such a union. The avoidance of this pain is the beginning of wisdom, for it is strong enough to contaminate the rest of our lives.
Compassion is loving others enough to say or do what is appropriate from an empowered heart without attachment to the outcome.
A prerequisite to empathy is simply paying attention to the person in pain.
No opposing quotes found.