Emotional distance and empathy, do they go together??

From being in a mental health field for a while, there is an important distinction between taking things personally and being empathetic. Sometimes, we want to understand those we serve so much that we begin to take their problems onto ourselves; we begin to identify with them, and care even more than they do.
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If we don’t “suffer” from the issues we hear from other people, it doesn’t mean that we are heartless and lack empathy; to the contrary, it’s the best thing we can do for ourselves and others when a serious healing is taking place…
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Only when we have emotional distance towards something, we can have an objective opinion about it. And trust, there is nothing worse than giving a biased and one-sided guidance to someone we actually care about.
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When something becomes personal, emotions may become our enemy and our judgement may be tremendously clouded. It will interfere with us understanding and seeing the situation for what it truly is.
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Empathizing with someone, carefully listening, providing a safe and warm environment to open up, and being able to reflect on their troubles and feelings are some of the ways we can relate to those we are trying to help, since we will never be able to fully “understand” someone’s pain.
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Again, no matter how developed our skills are or how magical our psychic powers may be, we will ALWAYS see a life of another through a lens of our own experiences, history, upbringing, social skills, intuition, and so on.
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And keeping the distance from a presented painful situation, looking at it from every possible perspective, and being compassionate, unbiased and supportive are the best things we can do.
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We can’t fix someone else’s problems, we can only be there while they fix it themselves.
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And, I love you!