Empathy begins with Listening and Pouring Genuine Love

 Kind words are short and easy to speak but their echos are truly endless - Mother Teressa

There are two ways to change someone's behaviour and influence someone's behaviour one way is positive the reinforcement and another is giving a negative reinforcement. And I have observed that irrespective of age, positive reinforcement works better than negative reinforcement in most cases. Positive reinforcement are the strokes in the environment which are provided to the individual which make that individual feel valued, loved, emphasized with and many other positive emotions.

With so many positive emotions around, one feels like doing that activity even more often. Putting yourself in someone's shoes is like understanding the other person's mind, how it is processing information.

What is that person thinking during a certain circumstance which will again later again lead to the behaviour which the person does.

Even when we say empathy is all about putting yourself in the other person's shoes, it actually is not easy, because you don't know the circumstance of the other person completely unless you begin with listening first. 

Listening in detail and let the person empty the person's heart and then only you will understand the circumstance of the other person. 

I have observed that even my child responds better when I listen to what she says, pay attention to the non verbal gestures and behaviours. She responds well when showered with love and attention when I am around and when I logically explain her if i am busy. At work I have seen executives performing at higher levels and engaging with their teams at higher frequencies because of positive gestures and feedback of their seniors. 

Every soul responds well to love, even animals. For sure we can make an impact in our lives if we use the carrot approach at times when we keep thinking of the stick approach.