'I think one of the most important things for people to do is to develop imagination in the sense of a sympathetic imagination. There are some people who can comfort you and some people who can't. And to be the good comforter, you have to be somebody who has a felt imagination for the circumstance of the person being comforted.
Marilynne Robinson in Timothy Larsen and Keith L Johnson, Balm in Gilead: A Theological Dialogue with Marilynne Robinson, p.204. 