Kareena Kapoor Khan recently shared a thought-provoking post about the humbling nature of life’s challenges, highlighting how true understanding comes only through personal experience. Her reflections on struggles like marriage, parenting, anxiety, and loss emerged weeks after her husband, Saif Ali Khan, was attacked at their Mumbai residence. Although her post did not directly reference the incident, it emphasized how life’s hardships alter one’s perspective.
Why Do People Struggle to Empathize Until They Experience Hardships?
Many people believe they understand life’s difficulties until they personally face them. Kareena Kapoor Khan’s post resonates with this idea, stating, “You will never truly understand marriage, divorce, anxiety, childbirth, death of a loved one, parenting… You think you are wiser than others until life humbles you when it’s your turn.”
According to Gurleen Barua, an existential psychologist at That Cultural Thing, the reason people often fail to empathize with struggles they haven’t personally experienced is due to the way the brain processes emotions. “True empathy is not just about understanding—it’s about feeling. Until a person goes through a situation, their brain does not process it emotionally but in a detached, logical way,” she explains.
How Trauma Changes Perception and Self-Identity
Experiencing trauma deeply alters a person’s view of themselves and the world. Barua notes that the brain’s fear center, the amygdala, becomes overactive after trauma, making the world seem more threatening. This heightened alertness can result in anxiety, hypervigilance, or emotional numbness, even in safe environments.
Trauma can also reshape self-perception. Many individuals struggle with feelings of weakness or guilt, questioning how they responded to the event. Some may feel disconnected from their previous identity, while others find new meaning and strength through post-traumatic growth. The hippocampus, responsible for memory, can also be affected, causing either a hazy recollection of the past or vivid, intrusive flashbacks.
The Role of Social Conditioning in Empathy
Barua highlights how social conditioning impacts empathy. Many cultures emphasize resilience, leading individuals to overlook struggles they haven’t personally faced. However, once someone experiences a challenge, their perspective shifts as they develop an internal memory associated with that struggle. This makes them more compassionate toward others in similar situations.
“It’s not that people lack empathy before they experience something—it’s just that real understanding often requires living with the feelings, not just observing them,” Barua adds.
Final Thoughts
Kareena Kapoor Khan’s post serves as a reminder that life’s greatest lessons often come from firsthand experiences. While it is natural to assume we understand another person’s pain, true empathy emerges when we face our own challenges. Difficulties have the power to change our perceptions, making us more compassionate, aware, and appreciative of the struggles that shape us all.
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