Empathic listening, described in Steven Covey s book, The Seven Habits of Highly Effective People , is an important tool in communicating for understanding. Empathic listening helps get inside another person s frame of reference, see the world from their point of view, and understand how they feel about it. This is different from the listening we ordinarily do. Attentive listening is admittedly better than the others, but not as good as empathic listening. It is important to understand that empathy is NOT sympathy.
Sympathy means agreement or judgment.
Empathic listening does not mean that you agree with someone. It is that you fully and deeply understand that person, emotionally as well as intellectually. With this understanding, you can impact that individual s behavior. Empathic listening requires you to first seek to understand, then, and only then, can you be understood. Empathic listening is powerful because it gives you accurate data to work with.