When a person empathizes, he can understand another’s feelings and even share them, but he is conscious of himself as a separate individual, capable of taking independent and useful action. When he becomes identified, that boundary disappears. He reacts as if he was himself the victim. He feels the victim’s humiliation, his helpless rage, his shame. This is not a state of adult human fellow feeling from which he can act effectively: it is a state of memory. He is gripped by the past. [..] No conscious awareness is necessary for the encoding of implicit memory, or for its being triggered. A tone of voice or a look in another’s eyes can activate powerful implicit memories.

— Scattered Minds by Gabor Maté (Page 248 - 250)