August 6, 2025 • 15 mins
There’s a career skill no one taught you in school.
It’s not on your resume. It’s rarely on a job description.
But it’s the difference between being heard and being trusted.
Between managing and truly leading.
Empathy.
And here’s the kicker…
Most people think they have it.
But very few understand what it actually is or how to build it.
Today’s lesson is one of my most personal.
I’ll walk you through the three types of empathy (yes, there are three), show you how to practice them, and share a story that changed how I live and love (this WILL bring a smile to your face).
If you want to deepen your relationships, earn trust faster, and elevate your career, this one’s for you.
If you'd like to build a great career and lead a rewarding life, check out some of these other places where I share my teachings:
1. Check out the milewalk Academy, my coaching and training site, for freemiums and premiums.
2. I have hundreds of educational and inspirational videos on my YouTube Channel.
3. Grab any of my three books related to interviewing, hiring, and goal setting. All can be found on my Amazon Author Page.
4. Follow me on Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter (X), TikTok, Threads, and Facebook.
5. Stay in touch with me in your email inbox by joining my newsletter here!
--Andy
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
(00:00):
There's three types of empathy this Daniel Goldman this isn't me I'm just giving you his definitions
there's the cognitive social and empathic concern so what these are is cognitive so imagine forget
empathy for a second talk about your mind are you a logical enough person that you could appreciate
(00:23):
that person's perspective that's cognitive empathy I'm really strong in this okay I can interset my
emotions I can put myself in your shoes and while I absolutely cannot process the world the way you
none of us can do that right there's no way I wish I could strike the words from the English or any
(00:44):
language when somebody says I know exactly how you feel no that's impossible you cannot know exactly
how I feel because even if we both went through brutal divorces and we were married to this
men of the same age for the same amount of time and we have the same number of kids and we live
houses next door to each other you still can't know exactly how I feel because I
(01:05):
process everything that happens to me based on my upbringing my belief template the way this
thing happens to work from some DNA perspective and a number of other things but can I truly try
to gain perspective to imagine what you would feel like that's cognitive being being logical
enough that you could try to put yourself in the other person's shoes just to give yourself
(01:29):
a different way of thinking about the situation then there's social I'm I'm less good at this this
is about feeling like I literally can I feel for you not like oh geez I can understand that but I
actually am having a reaction okay like a physical reaction from a feelings perspective and then
(01:52):
empathic concern is social and active meaning I actually feel for you and now I'm comp to do
something I am moved to help you okay so I have used cognitive empathy to become more of these
others but recognizing I will never know exactly how somebody will ever feel I don't even try I
(02:20):
go from cogn I go from one to three that's how I operate so it's really one and kind of the tale
of three because I I don't I don't I know I know me I have never been one to get physical reactions
feeling reactions to somebody else's situation I get the oh my God that's awful or whatever or
(02:41):
that's terrible but I'm more about how can I help you I know that sucks right kind of thing and so
there's three different kinds now uh one of the things that I will tell you is that when I tried
to develop empathy and become more empathetic because I think it's like a super superpower
if you can be this way because virtually every job in the world the more empathetic you can be
(03:05):
the automatically the better you are at it and so what I tell people is there's kind of three
steps to building your empathy and if you much like willpower if you could do this all the time
you're going to become more empathetic it's going to become more natural anticipate the
situation what might they be going through what could happen what might they have gone through
(03:27):
what if they had a bad day right practice it during the interaction the communication and
then reflecting on what happened now you can do this one to one my wife walks in the door at 4:45
daily I have no idea what kind of day she had I don't know if she's coming in and you know the
(03:49):
kids were monsters or whether she's coming in and she had an easy breey day I don't know if a parent
called and screamed I don't know if somebody committed suicide I don't like the stuff that
comes home with her I can't get over so I also go through a blitz of a day every day there's not one
(04:10):
day I don't have any easy days that's it that's okay that's my life I choose this way so my day
is like Full Tilt all day long so I need to make sure that when she's coming in I'm anticipating
what what might she H might have happened and this isn't a contest about whose day was tougher worse
or whatever right and then when we talk I want to make sure that I have absolutely no idea how she's
(04:36):
able to sit and teach those kids all day because I would want to shoot myself so just I so I have
to imagine what that would be like and then I want to reflect did I did I actually act properly was I
empathetic now when I do it on a grander scale and I actually I think I talked about this in
the package I certainly talked about this in the book is every time I do a show like this it's like
(05:02):
every Thursday um if you come to the live office hour shows or maybe you've seen the recordings
I come and I teach and I take your questions and before every show I do one thing for five minutes
I kind of I sit just I relax I sit in the chairs back there one of the two of them or the love seat
and I say you know God brought these people to me at this time in their life right they need
(05:28):
my help uh that I don't know what you've all been through but one thing I know for sure is you don't
know what I know because if you knew what I know you wouldn't you wouldn't need to come and listen
to me talk on a Thursday right so you obviously need my help not to mention if you're spending
your minutes with me you have faith that I have something to offer you so I want to make sure
that I remember that as I'm teaching you and I'm trying to be compassionate and sensitive to your
(05:53):
situations even though I I could never understand fully what you're going through I just can't right
even if I lost a job or hated my job or hated my boss or hated my life or didn't make enough money
or whatever it was so it doesn't matter because I process it differently and the other thing is
then as I'm going through the session each time I'm making a point or I'm answering a question I
(06:17):
want to make sure that I am practicing empathy am I being kind they're asking me a question I
probably just got that question last week and the week before right you all have similar problems
you there's a finite number of problems I'm going to answer them over and over I've been doing this
for more than 6 years on a weekly basis meaning that the live Show's been going on for longer than
6 years there's only so many questions you can ask me okay but these people might they might not
(06:43):
have seen my 880,000 hours of videos they might have just found me this morning so I go through
I remind myself all then I practice it then when we're done I watch every show usually multiple
times and I try to watch it with different hats on and ears did I teach him what I was supposed
to teach him did I teach as fast as I could did I use the examples that were the best analogies was
(07:07):
I using a bad example for the person who asked it and they give me the information was I kind what
if I didn't know what they know I try to watch it from different angles so that number one I'm
evaluating me and my teaching skills but number two I'm also looking was I empathetic so these
are kinds of things that you could do if you're going to go in a meeting a sensitive meeting with
a client who you know is going to yell at you can you can you take yourself out of defense mode and
(07:32):
just try to think about what would it be like if I was that client and what if I was Lo losing money
because we made a hiccup or whatever kind of thing so I'm going to give you a little story I know I
absolutely absolutely have never told this story before so going back to the to the Linda my wife
situation so I met Linda in November of 2013 on Cara's birthday in fact and to Total coincidence
(07:59):
so I met Linda and we started dating and we hit it off and she was living quite far from me uh
maybe like 50 minutes on a good day and so we we um you know we were dating and it was the winter
time so she was in her school session which ran you know runs from August to to May and around
(08:24):
uh the spring she decides I think I would like to sell my house and I will move closer to you and my
son he's likely going to go away to college in the fall so this will be easier I could I could just
I could sell my house I could move closer to you things are going great now we're only a few months
into the relationship so at this point she puts her house on the market and the thing sells in
(08:49):
like a weekend and now now now there's still quite a a couple of months of the school left and so she
decides she's going to stay with a friend of hers near her school that way during the week it's easy
for her to get to school just a few minutes away but she's got two dogs the other The Other Woman
her friend had a couple dogs as well but it all worked out very friendly and I was thankful for
(09:13):
the fact that she had a place to stay so when school year was up I said to her uh okay it's
still relatively new in our relationship but why don't you move in with me and we we need to like
talk up front because if you move in in May and in you know in September you decide you want to get a
(09:33):
place closer to your to school I want to make sure that we're going in with this where we're keeping
a great momentum with the relationship I don't want that to be uh perceived or construed as a as
a setback so we you know we're talking through all this and so we decide that she's going to move in
with me okay now the relationship is I don't know DEC January February March April May six months in
(09:56):
she moves in and I'm thinking to myself let's see I'm a single man who's never lived with anybody
I'm 47 or eight or whatever I was at the at the time and I live in a 1700 ft condo that's designed
and laid out beautifully but to my taste the second bedroom is my office here she's going to
(10:19):
come in no school no work right off for the summer and she's going to have feet surgery both feet a
week after she moves in with me and she's going to be laid up on the couch for two weeks the two dogs
and me working okay can you at least recognize show a hands how many of you are laughing your
(10:40):
faces off because you're like what an idiot no I'm just kidding so so don't you imagine this okay I'm
48 okay first time somebody's gonna come in I work there she's there all day I'm on the phone
I'm trying to I'm trying to think about changing the business I got dogs yapping barking the
(11:05):
elevator SC like every like anytime there's an ant that farts my dogs bark okay so so so so I I okay
so we we talked through all this for about two three weeks before she moved in the only things
that I would think about when I had moments of time would be what would that be like to be her
(11:29):
to move into my place which isn't hers with somebody she only knows 180 days she got to
drive she will end up driving an hour each way she won't be anywhere near her friends
she's going to be late on the couch for two weeks I mean this this is a pretty this is a
pretty rough situation and so I I kept thinking about all that the this this step in the process
(11:59):
all of this what would this be like to be her to anticipate what her potential reactions could be
and how this would go and when I'm working I'm working I'm focused I don't want to be
interrupted kind of thing right so I'm I'm like laser F focused as you could imagine she moves
in and I'm not exaggerating for effect I did not have one one little pain not one nothing
(12:27):
bothered me because I was constantly concerned about her wellbeing and to the point where she'd
been in the uh condo about 3 weeks and she and after she was back up on her feet she and my
mom were driving somewhere on a Sunday morning they were going somewhere together and my mom
says to her so how you and Andy getting a line the condo and Linda says to her oh my God it's
(12:52):
great I can't believe how easy it is to live with him and my mom's like Oh was like what she like
well you know Andy's never live with anybody so I'm just so happy to you know that it's working
out but I'm I'm not kidding you and if she was sitting right here she would tell you that what
(13:13):
I just described was exactly what happened and so so wait I'm telling you the story because
it's funny cute story but it is an illustration of it doesn't matter what your situation is you
can figure out a way to be empathetic and really put yourself in the other people's shoes and go
through this process and simulate it before it happens because if you simulate it before
(13:36):
it happens it's so much easier when it actually happens now I'm not saying you're not going to
have a bad day and I'm not I've watched a lot of my shows and I'm a really really hard grader of
myself and there's some things that I saw in the last 6 months here or there that I was not happy
with the way I taught or the way I packaged it or what I said or how I set it or the speed I set it
(14:00):
with or the tone I set it in and I'm really really constantly evaluating it so I just I
want you to I want you to to understand that this affects everything in your life and you you either
are empathetic or you're not so it's an all the time kind of thing you either have willpower or
you don't you can either Focus or you can't so so these these three lessons all go together in
(14:24):
my opinion you you if you need to be focused you can't do anything and nothing registers and what
do I always say about experience experience is not what's happened to you it's the meaning you attach
to what's happened to you but in order to be able to gain the benefits of the experience as you're
going through it you need to be present and in order to be present you need to be able to focus
(14:45):
the more self-aware you are and the more congruent the think say do is the better the time you'll
have the less stress you'll have and the more empathetic that you can become well just generally
the better person you are okay so so that's that's what I wanted to cover teaching wise teaching wise
There's three types of empathy this Daniel Goldman this isn't me I'm just giving you his definitions
there's the cognitive social and empathic concern so what these are is cognitive so imagine forget
empathy for a second talk about your mind are you a logical enough person that you could appreciate
(00:23):
that person's perspective that's cognitive empathy I'm really strong in this okay I can interset my
emotions I can put myself in your shoes and while I absolutely cannot process the world the way you
none of us can do that right there's no way I wish I could strike the words from the English or any
(00:44):
language when somebody says I know exactly how you feel no that's impossible you cannot know exactly
how I feel because even if we both went through brutal divorces and we were married to this
men of the same age for the same amount of time and we have the same number of kids and we live
houses next door to each other you still can't know exactly how I feel because I
(01:05):
process everything that happens to me based on my upbringing my belief template the way this
thing happens to work from some DNA perspective and a number of other things but can I truly try
to gain perspective to imagine what you would feel like that's cognitive being being logical
enough that you could try to put yourself in the other person's shoes just to give yourself
(01:29):
a different way of thinking about the situation then there's social I'm I'm less good at this this
is about feeling like I literally can I feel for you not like oh geez I can understand that but I
actually am having a reaction okay like a physical reaction from a feelings perspective and then
(01:52):
empathic concern is social and active meaning I actually feel for you and now I'm comp to do
something I am moved to help you okay so I have used cognitive empathy to become more of these
others but recognizing I will never know exactly how somebody will ever feel I don't even try I
(02:20):
go from cogn I go from one to three that's how I operate so it's really one and kind of the tale
of three because I I don't I don't I know I know me I have never been one to get physical reactions
feeling reactions to somebody else's situation I get the oh my God that's awful or whatever or
(02:41):
that's terrible but I'm more about how can I help you I know that sucks right kind of thing and so
there's three different kinds now uh one of the things that I will tell you is that when I tried
to develop empathy and become more empathetic because I think it's like a super superpower
if you can be this way because virtually every job in the world the more empathetic you can be
(03:05):
the automatically the better you are at it and so what I tell people is there's kind of three
steps to building your empathy and if you much like willpower if you could do this all the time
you're going to become more empathetic it's going to become more natural anticipate the
situation what might they be going through what could happen what might they have gone through
(03:27):
what if they had a bad day right practice it during the interaction the communication and
then reflecting on what happened now you can do this one to one my wife walks in the door at 4:45
daily I have no idea what kind of day she had I don't know if she's coming in and you know the
(03:49):
kids were monsters or whether she's coming in and she had an easy breey day I don't know if a parent
called and screamed I don't know if somebody committed suicide I don't like the stuff that
comes home with her I can't get over so I also go through a blitz of a day every day there's not one
(04:10):
day I don't have any easy days that's it that's okay that's my life I choose this way so my day
is like Full Tilt all day long so I need to make sure that when she's coming in I'm anticipating
what what might she H might have happened and this isn't a contest about whose day was tougher worse
or whatever right and then when we talk I want to make sure that I have absolutely no idea how she's
(04:36):
able to sit and teach those kids all day because I would want to shoot myself so just I so I have
to imagine what that would be like and then I want to reflect did I did I actually act properly was I
empathetic now when I do it on a grander scale and I actually I think I talked about this in
the package I certainly talked about this in the book is every time I do a show like this it's like
(05:02):
every Thursday um if you come to the live office hour shows or maybe you've seen the recordings
I come and I teach and I take your questions and before every show I do one thing for five minutes
I kind of I sit just I relax I sit in the chairs back there one of the two of them or the love seat
and I say you know God brought these people to me at this time in their life right they need
(05:28):
my help uh that I don't know what you've all been through but one thing I know for sure is you don't
know what I know because if you knew what I know you wouldn't you wouldn't need to come and listen
to me talk on a Thursday right so you obviously need my help not to mention if you're spending
your minutes with me you have faith that I have something to offer you so I want to make sure
that I remember that as I'm teaching you and I'm trying to be compassionate and sensitive to your
(05:53):
situations even though I I could never understand fully what you're going through I just can't right
even if I lost a job or hated my job or hated my boss or hated my life or didn't make enough money
or whatever it was so it doesn't matter because I process it differently and the other thing is
then as I'm going through the session each time I'm making a point or I'm answering a question I
(06:17):
want to make sure that I am practicing empathy am I being kind they're asking me a question I
probably just got that question last week and the week before right you all have similar problems
you there's a finite number of problems I'm going to answer them over and over I've been doing this
for more than 6 years on a weekly basis meaning that the live Show's been going on for longer than
6 years there's only so many questions you can ask me okay but these people might they might not
(06:43):
have seen my 880,000 hours of videos they might have just found me this morning so I go through
I remind myself all then I practice it then when we're done I watch every show usually multiple
times and I try to watch it with different hats on and ears did I teach him what I was supposed
to teach him did I teach as fast as I could did I use the examples that were the best analogies was
(07:07):
I using a bad example for the person who asked it and they give me the information was I kind what
if I didn't know what they know I try to watch it from different angles so that number one I'm
evaluating me and my teaching skills but number two I'm also looking was I empathetic so these
are kinds of things that you could do if you're going to go in a meeting a sensitive meeting with
a client who you know is going to yell at you can you can you take yourself out of defense mode and
(07:32):
just try to think about what would it be like if I was that client and what if I was Lo losing money
because we made a hiccup or whatever kind of thing so I'm going to give you a little story I know I
absolutely absolutely have never told this story before so going back to the to the Linda my wife
situation so I met Linda in November of 2013 on Cara's birthday in fact and to Total coincidence
(07:59):
so I met Linda and we started dating and we hit it off and she was living quite far from me uh
maybe like 50 minutes on a good day and so we we um you know we were dating and it was the winter
time so she was in her school session which ran you know runs from August to to May and around
(08:24):
uh the spring she decides I think I would like to sell my house and I will move closer to you and my
son he's likely going to go away to college in the fall so this will be easier I could I could just
I could sell my house I could move closer to you things are going great now we're only a few months
into the relationship so at this point she puts her house on the market and the thing sells in
(08:49):
like a weekend and now now now there's still quite a a couple of months of the school left and so she
decides she's going to stay with a friend of hers near her school that way during the week it's easy
for her to get to school just a few minutes away but she's got two dogs the other The Other Woman
her friend had a couple dogs as well but it all worked out very friendly and I was thankful for
(09:13):
the fact that she had a place to stay so when school year was up I said to her uh okay it's
still relatively new in our relationship but why don't you move in with me and we we need to like
talk up front because if you move in in May and in you know in September you decide you want to get a
(09:33):
place closer to your to school I want to make sure that we're going in with this where we're keeping
a great momentum with the relationship I don't want that to be uh perceived or construed as a as
a setback so we you know we're talking through all this and so we decide that she's going to move in
with me okay now the relationship is I don't know DEC January February March April May six months in
(09:56):
she moves in and I'm thinking to myself let's see I'm a single man who's never lived with anybody
I'm 47 or eight or whatever I was at the at the time and I live in a 1700 ft condo that's designed
and laid out beautifully but to my taste the second bedroom is my office here she's going to
(10:19):
come in no school no work right off for the summer and she's going to have feet surgery both feet a
week after she moves in with me and she's going to be laid up on the couch for two weeks the two dogs
and me working okay can you at least recognize show a hands how many of you are laughing your
(10:40):
faces off because you're like what an idiot no I'm just kidding so so don't you imagine this okay I'm
48 okay first time somebody's gonna come in I work there she's there all day I'm on the phone
I'm trying to I'm trying to think about changing the business I got dogs yapping barking the
(11:05):
elevator SC like every like anytime there's an ant that farts my dogs bark okay so so so so I I okay
so we we talked through all this for about two three weeks before she moved in the only things
that I would think about when I had moments of time would be what would that be like to be her
(11:29):
to move into my place which isn't hers with somebody she only knows 180 days she got to
drive she will end up driving an hour each way she won't be anywhere near her friends
she's going to be late on the couch for two weeks I mean this this is a pretty this is a
pretty rough situation and so I I kept thinking about all that the this this step in the process
(11:59):
all of this what would this be like to be her to anticipate what her potential reactions could be
and how this would go and when I'm working I'm working I'm focused I don't want to be
interrupted kind of thing right so I'm I'm like laser F focused as you could imagine she moves
in and I'm not exaggerating for effect I did not have one one little pain not one nothing
(12:27):
bothered me because I was constantly concerned about her wellbeing and to the point where she'd
been in the uh condo about 3 weeks and she and after she was back up on her feet she and my
mom were driving somewhere on a Sunday morning they were going somewhere together and my mom
says to her so how you and Andy getting a line the condo and Linda says to her oh my God it's
(12:52):
great I can't believe how easy it is to live with him and my mom's like Oh was like what she like
well you know Andy's never live with anybody so I'm just so happy to you know that it's working
out but I'm I'm not kidding you and if she was sitting right here she would tell you that what
(13:13):
I just described was exactly what happened and so so wait I'm telling you the story because
it's funny cute story but it is an illustration of it doesn't matter what your situation is you
can figure out a way to be empathetic and really put yourself in the other people's shoes and go
through this process and simulate it before it happens because if you simulate it before
(13:36):
it happens it's so much easier when it actually happens now I'm not saying you're not going to
have a bad day and I'm not I've watched a lot of my shows and I'm a really really hard grader of
myself and there's some things that I saw in the last 6 months here or there that I was not happy
with the way I taught or the way I packaged it or what I said or how I set it or the speed I set it
(14:00):
with or the tone I set it in and I'm really really constantly evaluating it so I just I
want you to I want you to to understand that this affects everything in your life and you you either
are empathetic or you're not so it's an all the time kind of thing you either have willpower or
you don't you can either Focus or you can't so so these these three lessons all go together in
(14:24):
my opinion you you if you need to be focused you can't do anything and nothing registers and what
do I always say about experience experience is not what's happened to you it's the meaning you attach
to what's happened to you but in order to be able to gain the benefits of the experience as you're
going through it you need to be present and in order to be present you need to be able to focus
(14:45):
the more self-aware you are and the more congruent the think say do is the better the time you'll
have the less stress you'll have and the more empathetic that you can become well just generally
the better person you are okay so so that's that's what I wanted to cover teaching wise teaching wise
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