Is empathy 100% emotion?

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Yes, I know empathy is emotion in essence. But I think it's only the lack of demonstrated empathy that is stereotypical of ASD's. I am not sure if I have emotional or "feeling" muscles, so all I need to do is practice demonstrating these feelings, am I correct?

I'm going to start this reply by saying - I'm undiagnosed, and have only been looking at the symptoms and connecting them to my life of ASD for the past month, so I'm likely not the best person to respond, but here goes nothing:

Empathy is an emotion yes. I know for a fact that I feel empathy quite differently from "NTs" as the term seems to be. I don't usually "feel" it in the moment something is happening (like supporting a friend who is dealing with a loss). There are plenty of other examples of things I don't feel when and how an NT person might, such as appreciation, or emotional connection. If I "feel" these things, it's typically only when I'm alone and I can process events internally.

What I do know is that just because I don't have an internal "feeling" of empathy immediately if at all, it doesn't mean I don't care deeply for the person. It doesn't even mean I'm not capable of jumping in front of a train to save their life.

What I've done personally through a lifetime of trial and error is to learn and set "empathy" facial expressions, sounds (like "aaahhh"), and the right amount of human contact. I've been in the unpleasurable situation of being the primary person who was "there" for someone who was dealing with the death of someone close more than once. Each time I learn a little more, and modify my social scripts, and usually end up modifying the "human contact" part (like when to put an arm around them). It's escpecially difficult because when I'm grieving, the last thing I want is any human contact at all. So I'm learning to give something that seems like torture to me.

I bring this up, because specifically for me, by doing these things, I've found that it does increase my ability to feel certain things. I'm not sure I would call it empathy, but when I'm able to be there for somebody I care about, it does fill me with an indiscribible "feeling" of satisfaction, closeness, warmth. I guess they call that love. I don't feel those things in the moment, but I wrap myself up in them like a blanket later on, and I feel connected.

I'm lacking in empathy at the time I should have it. It is there for me, just not when I should have it. It is a feeling. I don't like it very much. It makes me feel bad. People say autistics lack empathy, personally l think I just don't want it.

I volunteer for The Samaritans in my spare time and that is something where you supposedly have to be able to empathise with people to help them.

I somehow do it. Not sure whether I really empathise though or whether I just know the right things to say.

I've always understood empathy to mean being able to pick up on what someone else is feeling and thinking based on non-verbal cues. Then there's compassion, which is about actually caring what they're feeling.

I also think empathy for feelings, and empathy for thoughts are two different things. I think I'm reasonably good at picking up feelings based on expression, tone of voice, body posture etc, but their thoughts are another matter entirely as this depends on complex inferences, non-literal use of language, and "hints".

It's also about projecting feelings and thoughts too. Apparently, so I'm told, I tend to project a fairly aloof, hard-to-get-close-to vibe, which is just about the opposite of what I'm really like, so it seems my feelings aren't being expressed properly.

My thoughts though project perfectly well, mostly because I just say what I'm thinking so theres no interpretation necessary. though it annoys the hell out of me when people insist on "interpreting" what I'm saying, rather than take it at face value as it's intended.

When it comes to knowing what to say to someone who's grieving, that's a difficult one, and lots of people have trouble with that, whether on the spectrum or not. In my experience, both as a griever and a comforter, the best thing to do is just let them know your there for them, whenever they need you and for as long as they need you, and be prepared to listen to them without trying to advise. Grieving is a slow process, with lots of ups and downs, over a number of months or even years.

I'd say you don't need to worry too much about what unspoken messages your projecting in this regard.. Instead just explain simply that you don't know what to say or do, but that you're thinking of them and willing to support them or just be there in whatever way helps. A grieving person will appreciate this.

definition

Full Definition of EMPATHY

1
: the imaginative projection of a subjective state into an object so that the object appears to be infused with it
2
: the action of understanding, being aware of, being sensitive to, and vicariously experiencing the feelings, thoughts, and experience of another of either the past or present without having the feelings, thoughts, and experience fully communicated in an objectively explicit manner; also : the capacity for this

Definition 2 is what most people mean by empathy. They use it to mean both picking up on a person's feelings and then feeling them yourself, vicariously. Picking up on the feelings is hard for us ASDers as is expressing feelings for many of us, as the OP described.

I don't think that it is 100% emotion. I've always thought of empathy as being the ability to put yourself in another person's shoes, an ability to see things from their perspective and try and understand what they are feeling and why they are acting the way they are. That takes logical thought and problem solving skills.

I genuinely think that I am good at empathizing with people because I step back and try and look at their circumstances and try and figure out why they are behaving the way they are. I find that NTs sometimes react emotionally to the way someone is behaving and they will be angry, upset or affronted by someone's behaviour whereas I say, "but have you taken into consideration that they may have said x because of y?" It annoys me when I see other people jumping to conclusions about other people's behaviour without trying to understand all the facts about a situation.

However, I often find showing affection to be a difficult thing to do. That is not the same as empathy though. I can feel moved to want to help, but not be sure about how to act.

Nah, there's definitely the subconscious, biology and instincts involved.
I don't have problems with empathy if I actually understand what's going on. I don't know what to do I can't see what I need empathy for. And to be an emotion, something has to go through the biological steps of being absorbed by the body with the help of our senses. So there are actually a lot of factors.

I specifically researched (as a young child) all (or many) of the instances in which people believed that empathy should be shown, and I just practice responding in the way that people want me to respond.
I guess I find it simple because it is part of my "seeming normal" obsession, but I've always known that what's natural for others wasn't natural for me. I learned to use the term "feel" and "sense" in language in order to help them be comfortable with my processing of the situation.

Under my definitions, empathy is instinct. One of the purest forms of instinct.

I agree in general, but will add that I think empathy requires understanding and a feeling of connection.

If I complained after a fire alarm went off to the people near me, I might get puzzled sympathy. If I create a thread at WP about the painful experience of sensory overload when the fire alarm goes off and it's loud and chaotic and there is suddenly intense sunlight, I'd expect there could be genuine empathy for what I felt.

Can one practice showing empathy to people who think and react differently? Absolutely, and practice improves performance.

I think it gets hard though to continually show empathy in a world where we feel like we don't get that much of it back. And when there isn't actually understanding.

I struggle with this concept constantly. I feel the same way as Clandestiny, it's generally after the fact and I have to be pretty drunk. Whenever I drink I feel different. It's like I have this wall up constantly but If I drink enough it comes down. When I mean enough, I mean completely hammered. I do not bring myself to this point very often but when I do, I feel. I might do this a couple times a year. I do not consider my lack of empathy as a weakness, to me it is a strength.

I sit down alone with a bottle of some kind of top shelf liquor and have at it. I turn off my phone. I like to put on some music with no lyrics (alter between weird "space" themed brainwave stuff on youtube and classical guitar). I go on a self discovery/reflection mission where I think about things that have happened to me recently in the past or people I know. I have to logically process the events and try really hard to think about how I would feel if it had happened to me. It is then I can feel for others, sometimes pretty strongly. The magic really starts to happen after 6 drinks and I generally stop around 10 drinks. I also like to have a notebook in front of me and I write down all kinds of weird stuff. I make lists, draw, outline ideas, etc......

When I'm sober I look at the notebook and sometimes I actually have really decent ideas.

I struggle to empathise with another human beings plight unless it's a situation I've been in my self or very similar to one I have experienced.

I agree, I believe my main issue is I have a terrible imagination and my memory isn't much better.

Even watching movies It never occurs to me what emotions the characters are supposed to be experiencing.

I'm a 100% logical thinker though and I'd say I have good problem solving skills.

After watching that BBC horizon program about autism I am wondering if I am actually any good a theory of mind. They had a test where two triangles interact. The autistic people made a story up about the triangles that was unique and not like what the NTs saw. The NTs all saw the same thing, But the autistic people all had their own ideas.

I wonder if I am just being positive about people and making up a story about why they got where they are and why they are acting the way they are so that I can be nice to them.

I wonder if I really do empathize or am I just fooling myself into thinking that I empathize because I try and see the bright side of the situation. Or maybe because when I have been misunderstood it is because I've had the best of intentions and it has been taking the wrong way, so because I know how I felt when misunderstood and branded as bad then I am more prone to give others the benefit of the doubt.

The brain is a strange thing.

What empathy is - actually feeling the emotions of the other person as they are feeling them. It's the connection on the non physical level - and as such complicated because scientifically speaking it's not supposed to exist, and yet NTs use this to function socially the whole time. I call it the ultimate paradox.

Autistics tend to be over sensitive to everything so learn early on to shut out external input. This is why there are problems with socialisation, because we can't plug into the others to sense how they are feeling and respond accordingly. If we let ourselves connect we get overwhelmed and have a meltdown.

I don't think we necessarily shut out input, isn't not being able to shut it out what leads to meltdowns? I think we empathize fine with what we see and understand, but because our reactions are sometimes different, people think we have no empathy.

But no one feels or shows empathy for what they don't understand and can't relate to.

I think I have a lot of empathy. It was one of the reasons I never considered ASD before I was diagnosed. Now, I think it's a misunderstood assumption about ASD people.

When I don't notice and/or respond, it's almost always because I am dealing with sensory overload.

I think my basic emotion systems are impaired or undeveloped, but I think they work in a very functional way. When I am not overloaded, I notice if the people around me feel "good" or "bad", but it's rarely more refined than that. However, I find that it is really functional this way. I notice NTs are often consumed with a lot more "categories" of feelings and are more paralyzed and come to weird conclusions (sort of like me in very other circumstance).

I shall stop now so it's readable.