Great leadership begins with being a whole human being.
No single challenge has been greater for me as a leader than learning how to take better care of the people I lead, and to create a safe, supportive space in which they can thrive. Like most men I know, I grew up with very little modeling around empathy — the ability to recognize, experience and be sensitive to what others are feeling.
Empathy proved especially difficult for me whenever I felt vulnerable. My instinctive response was to protect myself, most often with aggression. I equated aggression with safety, and vulnerability with weakness. Today, I recognize the opposite is often true. The more I acknowledge my own fears and uncertainties, the safer people feel with me and the more effectively they work. But even now, I'm amazed at how dense I can sometimes be.
Yes, emotions of empathy, love and compassion exist in prison. Understand, prisons are nothing more than a tightly controlled microcosm of society at large. We have good people, bad people, industrious people, slackers, young, old, middle age, the list goes on and on. So, think of it like this- whatever goes on in your community is generally the same thing that goes on in ours (well, minus the police state).....
We still love, hurt, empathize and sympathize, show and receive compassion on a daily basis, and most of the time, we aren’t even aware of it. We are human…
Can the brain be trained to be more receptive to the needs of others?
Emory researchers describe CBCT as a form of "mind training" or "thought transformation." For the practitioner of CBCT, the objective is to shift thoughts from "me" to "others" in the following eight steps:
(1) developing attention and stability of mind through focused attention training;
(2) cultivating insight into the nature of mental experience;
Objectives The aim of these two studies was to evaluate the effectiveness of the Mindful Self-Compassion (MSC) program, an 8-week workshop designed to train people to be more self-compassionate.
Results Study 1 found significant pre/post gains in self-compassion, mindfulness, and various wellbeing outcomes. Study 2 found that compared with the control group, intervention participants reported significantly larger increases in self-compassion, mindfulness, and wellbeing. Gains were maintained at 6-month and 1-year follow-ups.
Conclusions The MSC program appears to be effective at enhancing self-compassion, mindfulness, and wellbeing.
An international team of researchers has demonstrated, for the first time, that a particular area of the brain — called the anterior insular cortex — is where human empathy originates.
“Now that we know the specific brain mechanisms associated with empathy, we can translate these findings into disease categories and learn why these empathic responses are deficient in neuropsychiatric illnesses, such as autism,” said Patrick R. Hof, M.D., a professor in the Department of Neuroscience at Mount Sinai Medical Center in New York.
Purpose: To test the hypothesis that physicians' empathy is associated with positive clinical outcomes for diabetic patients.
Conclusions: The hypothesis of a positive relationship between physicians' empathy and patients' clinical outcomes was confirmed, suggesting that physicians' empathy is an important factor associated with clinical competence and patient outcomes.
Empathy, an essential component of the physician–patient relationship, may be linked to positive patient outcomes. Although this notion is consistent with the conceptual view of physician–patient relationships, empirical data supporting the association between physicians' empathy and tangible clinical outcomes are difficult to find. Several studies generally support the notion that the quality of the physician–patient relationship (as a proxy for empathic engagement in patient care) has a positive influence on patient outcomes.
Author Information
Dr. Hojat, Mr. Louis, Dr. Markham, Dr. Wender, Ms. Rabinowitz, Dr. Gonnella
Empathy is challenged by many factors beleaguering health care today. We are at a time in medical history when physicians are facing more training requirements and compliance metrics than ever before, ranging from incentives for hand washing to required communication skills training to improve patient satisfaction.
In addition, physicians are facing tremendous pressures in terms of the number of patients they are expected to see, the short amount of time in which they have to see them, the complexity of the health problems, and increasingly burdensome documentation requirements.
What is occurring during medical training across the country that would make students feel increasingly less empathy for the patients they will soon care for? A recent study out of Boston University by DC Chen et al, Characterizing changes in student empathy throughout medical school, added to the growing body of knowledge showing a decrease in medical student empathy over the course of their training. Helen Riess MD posted a piece on the October Massachusetts Medical Society’s Vital Signs blog,
Teaching Empathy Can Improve Patient Satisfaction, referencing the decline in student empathy over time, but also a Mayo Clinic study that reported 60% of practicing physicians show signs of burnout. If it’s true that so many physicians are this disenchanted with the practice of medicine, is it any wonder that providers need to be reminded to put patients at the center of care?
=The Evolution of Empathy In ancient Indian Hindu Vedic scriptures, there is the observation that life in a rock is life that sleeps; life in a plant is life that feels; life in an animal is life that knows, and life in human form is life that knows that it knows.
Animals have self-awareness through feeling and so possess self-consciousness to varying degrees according to the combined effects of social and neuronal complexity. This complexity becomes such that the human species, perhaps more so than most other animal species, has a reflexive consciousness in that awareness of the personal self is seen within an ever-widening comprehension of its relationship with the Great or Universal Self. Our empathic and empirical knowledge of the nature of sacredness and the sacredness of Nature increase accordingly. As the individuated self evolves along the continuum of increasing complexity/ consciousness, it becomes reflexive and thus increasingly aware of its ontology in relation to the Universal self: of being within Being.
Empathy, which implies a shared interpersonal experience, is implicated in many aspects of social cognition, notably prosocial behavior, morality and the regulation of aggression. The purpose of this paper is to critically examine the current knowledge in developmental and affective neuroscience with an emphasis on the perception of pain in others. It will be argued that human empathy involves several components: affective arousal, emotion understanding and emotion regulation, each with different developmental trajectories.
These components are implemented by a complex network of distributed, often recursively connected, interacting neural regions including the superior temporal sulcus, insula, medial and orbitofrontal cortices, amygdala and anterior cingulate cortex, as well as autonomic and neuroendocrine processes implicated in social behaviors and emotional states. Decomposing the construct of empathy into subcomponents that operate in conjunction in the healthy brain and examining their developmental trajectory provides added value to our current approaches to understanding human development. It can also benefit our understanding of both typical and atypical development.
Political liberals are "bleeding hearts" because they empathize so strongly with the sufferings of others as did the late George McGovern. As Bill Clinton so succinctly phrased it, "I feel your pain." When Republicans wanted to compete in the empathy department, they had to invent a new terminology to identify this strange bird. They called it a "compassionate conservative."
One might ask why conservatives have, or are perceived as having, too little empathy. Why do liberals have too much? A widely-credited explanation is in terms of competing world views.
The BodyCartography Project is a Twin Cities based company whose work explores empathy and the intersections of wild and urban landscapes through dance, performance, video, and installation. The inspiration for Super Nature came from a previous performance, where Bieringa observed the kinesthetic response of audience members to her eye contact and movement. That response is something that Ramstad and Bieringa encounter regularly through their somatic studies and their practice of Body-Mind Centering.
Compassion In Living, Compassion In Dying A One-Day Conference Exploring Living and Dying with Compassion in the Modern World A Program of Kagyu DC Please join us Saturday 2012 November 10thfor an introductory conference exploring the integration of compassion with both our living as well as our dying. Presentations willinclude hospice approach to end of life, interfaith contemplative dialogue, and end of life support and consultation resources.
Author and University of Chicago professor Martha Nussbaum will deliver a lecture titled, “The New Religious Intolerance: Beyond the Politics of Fear,” at 4 p.m. on Friday, Nov. 2, in the chapel, located on the Hamilton College campus.
Nussbaum will discuss her book, “The New Religious Intolerance: Overcoming an Age of Fear in an Anxious Age,” in which she regards the processes of fear that create intolerance, and the capacities for empathy, understanding and respect that may counter it.
Empathy has little to do with rallies, reports, celebrities or anti-defamation league banners. Empathy is a quiet, powerful work. Empathy is the power of understanding and imaginatively entering into another person’s feelings, or in simple colloquialism “walking in someone else’s shoes.”
Empathy is about “connecting.” Bullying, conversely, is about “disconnection.”
To develop a community ethos of empathy we must start with modeling kindness, compassion and acceptance. If we want empathy and inclusion in schools then parents must model empathy within the family, because the “demonstration” of empathy has a greater impact than “instruction.”
An international team led by researchers at Mount Sinai School of Medicine in New York has for the first time shown that one area of the brain, called the anterior insular cortex, is the activity center of human empathy, whereas other areas of the brain are not. The study is published in the September 2012 issue of the journal Brain.
Empathy, the ability to perceive and share another person’s emotional state, has been described by philosophers and psychologists for centuries. In the past decade, however, scientists have used powerful functional MRI imaging to identify several regions in the brain that are associated with empathy for pain. This most recent study, however, firmly establishes that the anterior insular cortex is where the feeling of empathy originates
How else can parents teach a child to be empathetic and compassionate towards others?
Children who have grown up in loving environments have some inherent compassion, because they been nurtured and have had their needs met. Our environments, and especially our parents’ actions shape young children and build the foundation of their personality. Children develop empathy as they witness kindness towards others, respect for other cultures and races, and examples of how to stand up for what’s right in the face of discrimination. As parents and caretakers model compassion and empathy towards their partners, children, friends, and even strangers, we demonstrate how to put our feelings into an action that helps the person suffering and alleviates their situation.
Our children observe our empathy when we assist someone who just dropped their groceries, return a phone left behind, stop a joke based on stereotypes, bring dinner to a new mom, or stick up for kids who are getting picked on. We are the model from which are children learn.
Fantastic artical..."Teaching kids about empathy is not just to feel sorry for someone; it’s moving beyond sadness or pity, and aspiring to change it. One way that kids learn empathy is through their journey of learning about other cultures and differing perspectives"
Empathy and compassion dwell at the core of the collective physician intention. We hold a noble commitment, and have taken a sober oath, to offer healing and caring to all who come to us with suffering.
In the swirling eddies of our busyness, we may take shortcuts that do not demonstrate how deeply we care about our work and our patients.
For example, most doctors interrupt and redirect patients' narratives after listening for only 20 seconds. Four out of five physicians ignore clues and expressions of affect. When we do respond, we quickly shift back to biomedical issues. I'm struck by these statistics.
Empathy is important in the physician-patient relationship. Prior studies suggest that medical student empathy declines with clinical training.
CONCLUSIONS:
Self-reported empathy for patients, a possibly critical factor in high-quality patient-centered care, wanes as students advance in clinical training, particularly among those entering technology-oriented specialties. In the era of new health care policy and primary care shortages, our research may have implications for the medical education system and admission policy.
Chen DC, Kirshenbaum DS, Yan J, Kirshenbaum E, Aseltine RH.
He said the 21st-Century generation, those 5 to 30, needs more knowledge, a vision, determination, will power to make the 21st Century one of compassion. He acknowledged that this new generation would have to solve the problems created by the 20th-Century generation.
The Dalai Lama promoted empowerment of the individual, encouraging individuals to step forward to alter attitudes necessary for a compassionate world. “Change begins with the individual. Not governments. Not religious leaders. Not the United Nations.”
As empathy dies and narcissism thrives, will culture survive? I know it's shocking and unexpected, but the evidence—both data-driven and anecdotal—indicates that people increasingly care less about others and more about themselves.
The founder of the Public Insight Network explains why he quit his day job, and why journalists are still not getting the full picture.
It’s not that empathy — the act of imaginatively entering into another person’s world — is unpopular. In the corporate world, “empathy” is increasingly how hard-nosed business types refer to understanding your customers and their needs. But in the journalism world I’ve traveled in for the last 15 years, the word feels somehow not hard or specific enough. It seems a little soft and fuzzy — not characteristics you’d generally associate with journalists.
And that’s why I’m leaping — to find a way to use technology to increase empathy.
I’m building GroundTruth: a mobile engagement and research platform.
The ‘Empathy Engine’
Before I get to the details of GroundTruth, let me explain a bit more background on why empathy is so important to me.
Standing for journalism, strengthening democracy | Journalism training, media news & how to's...
Journalism education should incorporate the study of empathy and compassion alongside its study of the objective method. The objective reporter who integrates into his or her work an empathetic, compassionate approach does not face irreconcilable demands.
The compassionate act, one that seeks to alleviate suffering, often follows a process that starts with empathy, i.e., the moment within which one connects with the other in an effort to see through his or her eyes, to know something through its meaning for that person.
When journalists practice an ethic of empathy and compassion, they do not forfeit their objectivity. Empathy seeks to understand the other, not produce agreement with the other. For this reason, empathy compels fair treatment of all sources.
Just as one should empathize with the poor person, he or she should empathize with the public official.
Empathy Movement Home Page at: http://j.mp/QS1cBc We are starting online discussions, organizing and planning for building an empathy movement. Join now and let's build a culture of empathy.
Center for Building a Culture of Empathy - A portal for resources and information about the values of empathy and compassion. http://CultureOfEmpathy.com
To get content containing either thought or leadership enter:
To get content containing both thought and leadership enter:
To get content containing the expression thought leadership enter:
You can enter several keywords and you can refine them whenever you want. Our suggestion engine uses more signals but entering a few keywords here will rapidly give you great content to curate.
Your new post is loading...
