Experiential Design, Emotions Science, and Empathic Relationships

20+ years of work with world class labs, leaders, and organizations have led me to a new definition of empathy, which underlies my approach to scaling empathic growth for organizations.

What If We've Been Getting Empathy Wrong This Whole Time?

Here's something that's been nagging at me: I think we've collectively misunderstood what empathy actually is. And that misunderstanding? It's making us worse at connecting with each other.

The dictionary tells us empathy means understanding how someone else feels. Sounds reasonable, right? Except when you really sit with that definition, it starts to fall apart.

Think about it from a purely practical standpoint first. How often do you actually know what you're feeling? Like, really know? I'd say maybe half the time on a good day. Our emotions are these complex, neurological tangles that we barely understand in ourselves. So the idea that we can simply understand what's happening inside someone else's mind—it's kind of absurd when you break it down.

But there's something even more troubling here. When we frame empathy as "creating understanding," we're actually setting up a problematic dynamic. We're essentially saying: if you're different from me, it's your job to make me understand you. The burden falls on whoever is furthest from the center, from the norm. They have to explain themselves, translate their reality, make it digestible for everyone else.

That's not empathy.

And maybe this explains why so many of us feel exhausted by empathy. We've been trying to do something that's not only impossible but also kind of harmful. We're creating more distance while thinking we're building bridges.

So what's the alternative? After years working in this space and talking with researchers, I've landed somewhere different. What if empathy isn't about understanding at all? What if it's about meaning?

Here's a definition you can act on: Empathy is the ability to hold someone else's story as being just as meaningful as your own. Not the same as yours. Not necessarily compatible with yours or having a perspective you agree with. Just... as meaningful. Even when—especially when—you see the world completely differently.

This shift might sound subtle, but it changes everything. It takes the pressure off understanding and puts it on recognition. On seeing. On acknowledging that someone else's experience is as real and as important as yours, even if you'll never fully grasp what it feels like from the inside.

Maybe that's what we actually need right now. Not more understanding. But more recognition that we're all living in stories that matter.

You can read more about that through this blog. If you’d like to have me come speak about it, just reach out here.

I’m passionate about sharing insights on practical empathy, bridging social divides, and experiential design. Below are select organizations and events that have invited me to speak:

Keynote, Lecture and Workshop Invitations:

• Harvard Medical School on increasing Affirming Patient Care through Experiential learning.

• Society for Neuroscience and Creativity on Experiential methods in scientific experiments.

• The Darden School of Business, on ‘Designing the Empathic Ethnographic Interview’.

• WillowTree Apps, on Depolarizing the Conversation on Advocacy in DEI

• Ford Motor Company, ‘How we can make radical change without changing the radicals’.

• Asian American Bar Association, on ‘How empathy builds resilience’.

• Triangle Organization Development Network, (on Empathy in the face of biases)

• University of Virginia, Department of Engineering on ‘Human Centered Design Thinking.’

• University of Virginia, Design Thinking Class ‘Building Professional Life around Values’.

• University of North Carolina, Chapel Hill, on ‘Experience Ideation and Empathic Design’.

• Robins Graduate School of Business, University of Richmond, on 'Experience Innovation’ (2020) & Empathic Leadership (2025).

• University of Amsterdam (De Vrijeacademie), on ‘Intergroup collaborative experiences’.

• Charlottesville Design Week on de-categorizing personality types.

• Keynote Speaker at San Francisco’s Social Capital Conference (SOCAP) - Impact Accelerator 2019, on empathic choice making with designing with a sense of connection.

• Keynote Speaker for Pensions and Investments Annual ESG Conference 2022 on ‘Belonging and the Bottom Line.’

• Keynote Speaker for Sensata - DEI Conference 2022 on ‘How we can create courageous collaboration without being discouraged.’

• Speaker at TEDX Oneonta 2022 - How we can make Radical Change without Changing the Radicals.

• Education First 2023, on ‘How empathy impacts SEL’ at their Social Emotional Learning in Action Conference.

Here below is my talk at the Social Emotional Learning Conference:

Biography:

Micah Wonjoon Kessel sang at the Metropolitan Opera before spending two decades designing new approaches to learning, applying research on emotions, empathy, and connection.

As Design Lead at the Interdisciplinary Affective Science Lab and Scientist-Practitioner Partner with the Center for the Science of Moral Understanding, he developed a social science-informed approach to experiential learning. He now serves as CEO of Empathable, whose technology uses social science, experiential learning theory, and AI to train managers and teams at Google, Meta, Deloitte, Massachusetts General Hospital, and United Way.

Empathable won the Harvard Culture Lab Innovation Fund Award from their council on Diversity, Inclusion, and Belonging. Micah has presented at Harvard Medical School, the Asian American Foundation, the National Association of Diversity Officers in Higher Education, and the Society for Neuroscience and Creativity. He was a Byron Fellow in 2019 and speaks German, Dutch, Flemish, Italian, French and English.