While these words are near cousins, they are not synonymous with one another. 

Sympathy means you can understand what the person is feeling. 

Empathy means that you feel what a person is feeling. 

Compassion is feeling what a person is feeling coupled with the willingness to relieve the suffering of another.

Sympathy

When you are sympathetic you are able to understand what the person is feeling. For example, if your friend's father has passed away, you may not be able to feel their pain but you send a sympathy card to let them know you are aware of their suffering.

Empathy

When you are feeling what another person feels, you are experiencing empathy. Empathy may arise automatically when you witness someone in pain. For example, if you saw a spider crawling up my arm, you may feel a tickle on your arm. But what about when you don’t automatically feel the sensation of another? There is another route to empathy. For example, perhaps you saw me slam my fingers in a car door, but you didn’t automatically feel that pain. Instead, you can imagine what it might be like to have your fingers slammed in a door, and that may allow you to feel my pain. By the way, empathy isn’t reserved only for unpleasant feelings. For example, when someone walks into the room smiling, you smile spontaneously. For the most in-depth explanation of empathy you can refer to the what the famous psychotherapist Carl Rogers said in this page. 

Compassion

When you are compassionate, you feel the pain of another (i.e., empathy) and you do what you can, to alleviate the person’s suffering. At its Latin roots, compassion means “to suffer with.” When you’re compassionate, you’re not running away from suffering, you’re not feeling overwhelmed by suffering, and you’re not pretending the suffering doesn’t exist. When you are practicing compassion, you can stay present with suffering. Thupten Jinpa, Ph.D., is the Dalai Lama’s principal English translator posits that compassion is a four-step process:

Awareness of suffering.

Sympathetic concern related to being emotionally moved by the suffering fo another person. 

Wish to relieve the suffering of that person. 

Offering help to relieve that person's suffering. 

Simply listening with your full presence can be one of the most compassionate acts you can offer.  An important distinction between empathy and compassion is how they can affect your overall well-being. If you are frequently feeling the pain of another, you may experience overwhelm or burnout. This is a common problem for caregivers and health care providers, and it’s been labeled “empathy fatigue.” Compassion, however, is a renewable resource. When you are able to feel empathy but then extend a hand to alleviate someone’s pain, you are less likely to burn out. Research indicates that compassion and empathy use different regions of the brain and that compassion can combat empathetic distress.

The Dalai Lama famously said in the book The Art of Happiness, “If you want others to be happy, practice compassion. If you want to be happy, practice compassion.”

Condensed from "Compassion It"

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