Candid Conversations Newsletter: Empathy and the Paradox of Self-Awareness

Out of the abundance of the heart, the mouth speaks.

Lately, I’ve been more withdrawn. Not alienated. Not lost in a fog. Just careful about where I spend my energy.

Some rooms are light and energizing. Others pull at me until I leave more drained than when I entered.

And still, sometimes I step in anyway, because presence is required.

That choice, to know the cost and step forward anyway, is what Daniel Goleman, in his book Emotional Intelligence, might call both self-awareness and self-regulation.

An Old Friend, A Changed Conversation 🫂

Recently, I reconnected with a friend I hadn’t seen or spoken to in years.

Once, we were close. The kind of close where a look carried whole conversations. But time, distance, and missed chances had stretched the bond thin.

We met for drinks through a mutual friend. The greeting was awkward. Handshake or hug? Eventually we found a rhythm.

On the surface, it was like old times. Underneath, it wasn’t. We were both older, both shaped by experience, but not in the same ways.

Listening Beyond the Words 👂🏽

One thing life has taught me is how to listen past the words.

To hear the pauses. The tone. The texture. Those little clues that reveal what hasn’t been said.

That evening, I could tell my friend had done some work. They had the language. The books. The frameworks. Maybe even a few metaphoric t-shirts.

But something was missing. There was little space for compassion.

Their perspective was simple: If I could do it, so can they.

On one level, I understand. On another, I don’t.

The Missing Grace 🕊️

Emotional intelligence doesn’t stop at self-awareness.

It grows into social awareness. Recognizing where others are.

And into relationship management. Meeting them there with patience and grace.

Grace here isn’t religious.

It’s about making room for contradiction. Remembering that your lens isn’t the only one.

Without it, ego swells. Empathy slips to the background. We become more concerned with proving what we’ve overcome than understanding what someone else is facing.

My father once told me, “The higher the monkey climbs, the more it exposes himself.”

An old African proverb that fits here too well.

The Paradox ☯️

Here’s the paradox.

Self-awareness should make us more empathetic. The better we know ourselves, the better we should understand others.

But when self-awareness hardens into certainty, I’ve done the work, I know the way.  It closes the very door empathy needs to walk through.

That night, I realized how often therapy language and shadow work get weaponized. The tools meant to deepen compassion are twisted into measures of superiority.

Intellectual empathy was there. The ability to explain.

Emotional empathy was absent. The ability to feel.

And there is a difference.

Sometimes that difference points to something deeper. The exchange with my friend reminded me of  alexithymia, the difficulty some people have in identifying and expressing emotions. People who carry it can explain sadness but not access its depth. They lean on intellect but struggle with compassion.

It’s not arrogance, but limitation.

Without emotional resonance, grace becomes optional.

I’ve often written about my childhood community. What I haven’t mentioned is that it held twelve churches within a two-mile radius.

People were known one way most of their lives, yet after a single night or day at church, they would return armed with memorized scriptures and sharp-edged sermons, often introduced with “Pastor said…”

“Unequally yoked” was a favorite.

Yet days later, some of those same voices could be found at a card table with drinks flowing. That duality,  conviction without humility created more push than pull.

It reminded me of my friend. Strong in conviction, fluent in the language of healing, but missing the humility that draws people closer.

Intellectual empathy was present. Emotional empathy was absent.

Something to Think About 🤔

Goleman distinguishes between cognitive empathy, emotional empathy, and compassionate empathy.

One understands. One feels. One acts.

My friend leaned hard on the first, but skipped the others.

And that’s the paradox I can’t stop circling.

The very tools that should soften us can make us rigid if we hold them too tightly.

Self-awareness without humility becomes judgment in disguise.

The work, then, isn’t just knowing yourself. It’s staying tender enough to keep listening.

Not with answers ready. But with space.

Because wisdom doesn’t announce itself from the top of the climb.

It whispers from the ground. Where empathy meets grace. And where growth without humility is only half the journey.

That night with my old friend even reminded me of Spider-Man. When Peter Parker’s uncle said, with great power comes great responsibility, he wasn’t just talking about superpowers.

Strength, in any form, carries responsibility. Emotional, intellectual, financial, physical. It isn’t about proving how far you’ve climbed. It’s about how you use what you’ve gained once you’re there.

This is the paradox again. Self-awareness is a kind of power. It should help us lift others. But without humility, it turns in on itself. It becomes performance, superiority, judgment.

With great power comes responsibility. And with great self-awareness comes the responsibility to carry grace. To meet people where they are, not where we think they should be.

Because without empathy, self-awareness is only half the work.