Empathy can be the best that you can offer to those around you. Feeling others and dealing with what hurts them as if it hurts you is the greatest thing the other wants, when the wind blows it, sympathy as defined by psychology, is what it means to "bleed together", but is reaching To this degree of identification with the other is a good thing all the time, and when can excessive sympathy be considered a danger sign that warns that you are in a toxic relationship and not a relationship that gives you a sense of strength and balance.

Excessive sympathy, perhaps as dangerous as lack of empathy, the difference between the two, that the second harms others, but too much sympathy may be a danger to your own safety.

So what's the problem with so much compassion?

The answer was published by "Mind Valley" in an article by the psychotherapist, John Butcher, stressing that the suffering of an sympathetic person does not stop at the boundaries of a single case he sympathizes with, but as a sentimental person he sympathizes with everyone, his feelings fluctuate between ups and downs all the time, people Sympathizers pour their conscience and feelings into the experiences of others, which makes them feel that these problems belong to them, between positive feelings for people, and negative feelings for others that may lead to suicide, and these sympathizers fluctuate, so they develop what is called "sympathy disorder."

Psychology defines this disorder as a physical or cognitive defect that prevents you from acting as others act, but how can something that appears positive and useful such as sympathy be a disorder ?!

Most of the things that go over the limit become untrue. You simply exceed the limit of empathy, which is what happens when you allow other people's feelings to dominate your mental state.

We can put in place safeguards that protect us from confusion and mixing our feelings with others (Getty Images)

Set boundaries

Butcher identifies the problem of excessive sympathy, in reaching the stage of "emotional exhaustion", which is the state in which sympathy becomes a burden, and you must then realize that the most important relationship in your life is your relationship with yourself, which is also emphasized by the psychologist Elizabeth Seagal, in her article On Psychology Today, healthy compassion is an understanding that we are mere visitors of other people's emotions, we are not their owners, and cannot allow them to possess us.

But can sympathy be stopped?

If you are asking this question, unfortunately the answer is no.

Segal says that empathy does not come with a key to stopping, but we can only put guarantees that protect us from confusion and mixing our feelings with the other, and this needs several skills that can be learned - including regulating emotions and maintaining an equal distance between ourselves and others - and with these skills we can dive away. In other people's feelings, then safely return to ourselves and our own feelings.

Do not be afraid to back down when you share the feelings of others and take time to process what you are going through, and do not be afraid to apologize for continuing. Your current apology for participating gives you an opportunity for a longer stay, but your fear will make your late departure a permanent absence, as maintaining our emotional and psychological harmony makes us healthy for Ourselves, and it gives us the ability to be available to others.

In the end, dear sympathetic, you should know that sympathy is a state of give and take, so do not waste all of your energy on someone who throws his negative loads on you all the time, without giving you an opportunity to talk about yourself and your feelings.

Segal says that you must set boundaries up front to protect you, to communicate how you feel about this person, and never allow these people to violate your inner peace under the pretext of excessive sympathy.