Over time, a romantic relationship that lacks compassion and empathy becomes a frigid environment as frost slowly encrusts the heart, replacing kindness and warmth with disinterest and cold indifference.

For a romantic relationship to flourish and endure, compassion and empathy must be actively present. To withhold empathy and compassion is to withhold love and concern.

Compassion equals caring. Whereas empathy is being able to understand how your partner feels and what they’re going through and why – it’s putting yourself in their shoes. To show compassion means being sympathetic, showing concern for someone else’s suffering, and sharing their journey. 

Compassion

How compassionate are you to your significant other? 

Being compassionate means having sympathy and concern for your partner and showing it!  

Compassion is standing beside them as they journey through their dark valley of suffering. It’s being there for them during their difficult moments and supporting them in your words, thoughts, and actions. 

When you have compassion for your partner, encouraging words of hope and comfort flow from your lips into their heart like a healing balm. You listen to them as they share their struggles, and you let them know that you hold them lovingly in your thoughts and prayers. 

True compassion goes beyond mere words. Compassion is a verb. It’s taking the initiative to lighten their load and making their life a bit easier when they’re having a hard time. Maybe you run errands for them, make their favorite meal, help them follow up with difficult calls or tasks, or hold them warmly within a loving embrace. 

If you’re truly a compassionate person, your partner will know because they will notice it and feel warmly supported by you.

Empathy

Empathy means you understand what your partner is going through, either because you’ve been through it yourself or because you have a gift – the ability – to feel and know what they’re going through.

You share their thoughts and emotions. It doesn’t necessarily mean you condone or agree. It just means you understand how and why they feel the way they do and with what they’re going through; you feel and relate to their feelings.  

Becoming More Compassionate

To become more compassionate to your partner, start by becoming more compassionate with yourself. 

Be more loving and gentle to yourself when your inner critic starts beating you up. 

Be kinder in your actions with how you treat yourself. 

Remind yourself that you are worthy of love, success, and happiness. 

Practice self-compassion by leaving shame, guilt, and fear behind.

There’s a good chance that how you treat yourself is how you treat others. If you’re harsh and critical to yourself, you’ll tend to be harsh and critical to your partner. 

You’ll find that once you’ve become more compassionate with yourself, you’ll naturally be more compassionate to your partner. 

Becoming More Empathetic

Although some people are born naturally gifted with the ability to be empathetic and put themselves in someone else’s shoes, here are things you can do to become more empathetic. 

Listen to your partner without judgment! Let them talk. Strive to understand. Don’t listen to prepare your prosecution or defense. Let them unburden their heart. Show that you care by actually caring! 

Besides listening to understand, do your best to try to “feel” what they’re going through. They have a reason for feeling the way they do. Put yourself in their situation – even if you don’t agree with them and have a completely different perspective on the matter. Putting yourself in their emotional shoes goes a long way towards being more empathetic. 

Lastly, besides listening to understand and putting yourself in their emotional shoes, be real! Be vulnerable. Be authentic. Just try to be human, for goodness sake. Let your guard down and let them in! 

You can have a warmer, happier relationship if you want one, but it’ll require you to be more compassionate and empathetic. Replacing cold indifference and disinterest with genuine interest and warm words and acts of kindness is all it sometimes takes to reignite your marriage or romantic relationship because your partner will feel and know that you actually care.