Empathy Hurts

I was thinking about empathy. I do that a lot. I was wondering why people avoided really empathizing with another person. Even people who know all about empathy, such as people trained in Nonviolent Communication do not empathize as much as one would think. So I watched myself to see what happens when I empathize.

As I took myself through the feelings step by step, I noticed that at a certain point I had to take my attention off myself. Some part of me did not like losing my attention. So that is certainly one reason people find empathy difficult. Then at another point I saw that I during empathy I feel the same emotion as the other person. If she felt sad, I felt sad. If she was angry, I felt angry. Since, like most people, I do not enjoy feeling sad or angry, I wanted out of the emotion. I wanted to feel better, so I immediately sought to make the other person feel better. I either wanted to console them or advise them.

Two experiences make empathy difficult, having to focus exclusively on someone else for a few moments and feel what they are feeling. We become like a tuning fork resonating to the pitch of A.  The other person is vibrating at sad frequency and we attune to it. However that's not the final piece. For I must also know in my heart that pain is OK. It's like taking your child to the doctor for a vaccination. You feel the child's fear, resonate to it, while at the same time knowing that her fear is OK.

You match the child's frequency. The child feels that you understand. The child feels heard, and so doesn't feel the need to fight against his own feelings. He doesn't have to stuff the feelings down, ignore them, or belittle them. If you are calm with his fear, then so is he!
The fear is free to work itself out on its own. And it does. What a gift your presence has given this child.

But what I notice is, that to do this, one must have faith in the experience of natural pain. (meaning pain that comes naturally from life experiences) All our lives we are told that pain is bad. That pain may even be a sign of moral weakness. Drug companies and chocolate makers bank on our fear of painful emotions. But we are more than physical bodies. Our souls journey toward wisdom and meaning. All emotions bring valuable information to us. To suppress them or advise them away is to lose their messages.

Just for fun imagine that you lived in a society that frowned on laughter. (I think the Puritans might have been such a society) If every time you laughed someone tried to help you suppress it, what would you lose? Wouldn't that be weird? Fortunately we live in a culture that trusts laughter's effect on us.

How to make self-judging fun

In response to an email about judging oneself harshly for judging oneself; The part of you that judges is the part of the brain devoted to making sure you can fit into this culture.  If you think about it, every judgment you have comes from somebody else. I notice that I have no  judgments about purple spotted kitterwogs, for example, because I have never heard anyone talk about  them. If one could imagine our culture as a field of thoughts and beliefs, then judgments could be seen  as floating around that field. As we grow up we tune into the field and are programmed by repetition.  Nothing about judgments are personal. When I meditate I watch the judgment thoughts as they float  through, I can really feel how they are not personal to me. I see myself as merely the receptacle for  the culture’s field. I can’t help my judgments anymore than I can help what the current fashions are or  the kind of city I live in It has all been decided for me. As I watch me make judgments, I notice that there are two me’s watching. One ‘me’ is a continuance of  the cultured mind. That me is judgmental of my judgments because in this culture we are fond of making  people feel guilty for the very things they have been taught. The other ‘me’ is strictly an observer. She has no judgment. She seems to look on with what I would call compassionate interest. She is actually  more of a Me than me. When I look through her eyes, I see “my” thoughts as not “my” thoughts.  I see the judging self as just a wonderful example of this culture, but I also experience myself as  more than this judging self. I experience myself as this loving watcher as well. Now I notice that judgments still pass through me. I still judge the driver in front of me, the authority  figure blocking me, my ability to stay on a diet, and so on. And then I notice that I judge my judging.  And then I notice that everything I just thought was taught to me by somebody and is not personal to me. I suspect that you know all of this already, but your description of judgment inspired me to remember  about the impersonal nature of our thoughts. We think our thoughts are ours, but they are not.  I think that is very cool. From this perspective, it’s even possible to have fun with thoughts  and beliefs like judgments. There’s something about seeing this culture stamped inside of me  that is funny. I have this whole thing about aging right now. It’s so interesting to watch these  taught beliefs about my attractiveness and vitality seeping away. If I were in another culture,  I might look forward to aging as a time of great status. Now I fear it for loss of status.  My mind is just playing out this culture’s meme about aging and  here’s the kicker - there’s nothing my mind can do about it.

Feeling Heard

Notice for a moment how you feel reading the above cartoon compared to how you feel reading the cartoon in the previous post. Imagine if you were the little poodle. Which mom would you want? This mom is really putting her whole heart into the discussion and even though we are outside observers -  we can tell which one feels good to our heart. We can feel the connection.

I just love that feeling. There is such a giant difference between communicating with the heart and the head. Communicating with the heart means you resonate with the other person's experience. You don't try to fix it. You don't try to change it. You don't judge it. The heart joins. There is one place we do this easily. Laughing. When a friend is laughing, we join in or if we don't get the joke, we smile in resonance with their obvious good time. It wouldn't occur to us to try to change their laughter or advise them out of it.

We think that we have to help a sad or angry person out of their unhappy state. But trying to change their experience is just as invasive as trying to change a laughing person's experience. It's the experience that counts! Isn't that interesting? Our experiences bring us wisdom. We need to have them fully. We want others to witness our experience and then speak from the heart that they witnessed us. Just like the mother poodle in the cartoon.

Age of Heart

"The Map directed me from the Age of Reason to the Age of Heart. It was now time for the Indians to show the non-Indians how to think through the heart and not through the mind." 

    Joseph Rael, House of Shattering Light, Council Oak Books cc. 2003, pp. 115

Nonviolent Communication founder Marshall Rosenberg calls his way of speaking a language of the heart. My favorite aspect of NVC is empathy. Not only does empathy help you to understand where someone is coming from - it heals the heart. But it's not easy to do, for one thing, empathy requires full attention.

Mom thinks she is empathizing with her child. True: her mind is engaged, but not her heart.
The other day, I saw a very distracted dad repeating back what his little boy said to him. Clearly he had learned the parenting lessons on reflecting back what is said. The child kept repeating with increasing intensity that his fingers felt like they were burning. The father repeated back dutifully, "Your fingers are burning." All the while the dad's eyes were on the ingredients list he was reading. It's not easy to shop with a four year old! The child kept repeating that his fingers were burning and the dad kept mirroring back that his fingers were burning. It was an excellent example of the limits of intellectual involvement only. The child simply did not feel heard by his dad's heart.

When the Universe sends a Message

I attended another class with Arny Mindell, founder of the Process work Institute. His work is really bending my brain. I'm so accustomed to learning everything through my intellect. Arny works with body feelings. He has us moving around the room feeling our body's response to certain questions. The body answers these questions with an emotion and movement. What fascinates me is how intelligent the answers are; every bit as intelligent as the intellect and maybe more intelligent in some cases.

I admit that I follow his instructions with a level of distrust. My mind scoffs at his instructions asking for me to draw the energy of a feeling or act it out. It sounds really silly. And I think I must look silly bending and waving my body. Fortunately everyone else is gyrating around too. (Funny what we will do if others are doing it, too, no?) But then a real insight actually comes into my mind! It's like magic.
Who knew the body was so wise?

Raphael Cushnir says that emotions have a message and that when we avoid our emotions with addictions, we don't get the message. The message then uses dreams, life events, and illness to try to get our attention. Only be allowing the feeling to live within us, and only by being compassionate with that emotion, can the message it carries live within us. I think that Arny's work is very similar. Arny says that the Universe as a consciousness sends us messages and that if we resist the message by avoiding it with addiction or putting it down as silly, the message will try to get through as illness, dreams, and unconscious behavior. Both Raphael and Arny use acceptance as a key part of their healing work. But Arny uses the wisdom inherent in the body, too. It turns out the body is smarter than I thought.

Connecting Frequencies

I joined Christina Pratt's Shamanic Journeying class last night. What a beautiful space her husband designed. He is an acupuncturist, so he made sure to have all kinds of elements represented - wood, metal, stone, water, and fire. Whatever magic he used worked to make the whole place seem to breathe.
Christina was warm and funny. She made the me feel welcome and comfortable.

A musician played crystal bowls. I hadn't heard those bowls before in person. The vibrations go right through the body. They sound ethereal and feel soothing. It's easy to meditate in such an atmosphere.
I also noticed that the sounds helped to create a sense of harmony and lightness in the room of people. Which makes me wonder - what would happen if all meetings started with good harmonics? What if before a meeting started - everyone chanted together, or played drums together, or anything that helped create a sense of connected frequencies?

And isn't empathy a kind of resonance? When I empathize with someone, I am resonating with their experience. I am tuning in to their frequency. I feel as they do, like a tuning fork picking up a tone. Everyone craves empathy. Try it. Next time someone tells you something, do not give any advice or console them, instead empathize with their experience:

"My boss probably thinks I don't know my job."

(It's tempting to console like this - "That's not true!", but instead empathize like this)

"You sound discouraged. Did something happen today to make you feel incompetent?"

(Now the person will turn up their emotional frequency a little louder, because they can feel the attention and care)

"Yes! I totally goofed up a report. And it was my fault, too. I put in the wrong figures."

"Oh that can be so embarrassing when that happens! It sounds like you're worried that she will look down on you after this." (still resonating with the friend's experience)

"I KNOW she will. I feel so stupid."

"Have you lost hope?"

"Maybe, a little, mostly I feel stupid."

"Are you mostly mad at yourself?"

"Yeah, I am. Maybe she isn't that upset, but I'm pissed with myself."

"I am so much harder on myself than anyone else is. That's what it sounds like you have going on.
Self punishment is us!" (See how this person continues to hold her friend's frequency? But now it has shifted by itself. Watch.)

"Oh yeah, That is so true. I am so hard on myself, it's ridiculous. I had me losing this job and you know what, I'm really good at it and my boss knows that, and anyone can make a mistake. Geez. I always think I should be perfect."

"I know how it is. Do you feel better now?"

"Yeah, weirdly enough, I do. Thanks for listening."

The above conversation is based on real situations I've been in. Empathy is resonating with the other person like a harmony. It's very healing.

Process Work Institute again

I'm thinking some more about what really excited me at the forum I attended last week at the Process Work Institute in Portland. Usually in a discussion, the only points of view represented are the views of the participants. So if my church (this is a true story) has a discussion about getting more races represented in the church and the only people having the discussion are Euro-americans, then the only point of view we hear is the Euro-american one. That's how we usually discuss things. Arnold Mindell, founder of PWI, separates out the points of view as having their own value. If I understand him correctly, many points of view exist in any conversation, whether there are people to speak them or not. If no one is there to speak them, he calls them the ghost point of view. To really understand a topic thoroughly, ALL points of view must be heard.

In the forum last week, one woman stood up and spoke for the billionaires, since we had no billionaires attending the forum. In a discussion about economics, she thought that the billionaires would have a view. Especially since some of us were trashing them from our point of view! She was not attacked. Everyone understood the valuable function she played. Others joined her who could identify in some way with her point of view.

The result? Much more compassion and a recognition that solutions are not simple. The forum was practice for a group of students, so we only met for a couple hours. I believe that if we could meet over several days with this sort of listening and empathizing with a variety of view points, we would reach real depth in our conversation and a glimmer of what a real solution might actually look like.

Do I Join?

So do I join this group? Let’s call them the Board of Directors or BD group. I don’t think it will be an easy group to enact changes in. Here’s why: two male members have been on the board for three years and are very close friends. They have seniority, belong to the more politically powerful gender, are older than everyone else, and there are two of them. Arnold Mindell, Process Work Institute, talks about rank as the hidden denominator in groups and I think he is right on the money. These two men have lots of rank and are the de facto power in the group. The only woman member had the courage to point out some issues that the other men perceived as criticism. I watched the men pepper her with questions and she looked like she had run into a boulder. Her posture was rigid and her face looked like it had been flattened into a stiff sheet.  She needed some empathy that’s for sure, but none was forthcoming. The men felt attacked and they pushed back.

Later, she said she felt heard, so obviously she is so used to boulders she doesn’t register them as blocks anymore. Earlier, when she was asking for a facilitator to help make the conversation safer, I got all excited, because that is what I do. I make it safe for everyone to talk in a group. But the men didn’t think that would be necessary, they were doing it already, they said. I about wet my pants with frustration, but since I was a visitor I kept mum.

Party On!

I watched as the chores were being divvied out at a meeting recently. One member actually grimaced as he agreed to one thing after another. Earlier he had confided that his life was really full, so I had no idea when the group expected him to accomplish his tasks. I noticed that the other members were not excited about their jobs either. One person refused to do a task because she lacked energy for it.

The group talked about ways to get new members for more energy. And that was the reason I was there; I was investigating to see if it might be something I wanted to do. But early on I found out what the problem was – it was the kind of problem that should stop a group in its tracks and usually does. The group had been formed around a purpose that no longer existed.

It seems to me that when life loses purpose, Nature lowers the energy volume. It’s time to sit still, meditate, and dream. But our culture vilifies the image of laziness. One friend of mine quipped that he would never brag about having a lazy day to friends he wanted to keep. “Busy, busy, busy” as Bokonon says in Kurt Vonnegut’s Cats Cradle. It’s hard enough to get myself to agree to do nothing, let alone a group. And yet, when a group lacks energy, I think that is the message. “Stop doing stuff!” It’s time to hang out, dream, and dare I say it? Party!

At the turn of the 20^th Century, some of the great thinkers and artists of that time gathered at salons. Gertrude Stein hosted famous parties out of which whole intellectual movements were born. A party is a great way for a group to play around with ideas. Relax in a lounge chair, listen to great music, and dream up stuff together. Since it’s a party, no one expects great ideas or even ideas that make sense – making it all the more likely that an unexpected, good idea will show up. 

Process Work Institute

Well there's nothing like seeing a theory become a real living thing. Last night, I attended an 'Open Forum on Economics' put on by some students of the Process Work Institute. PWI was founded by Arnold Mindell and teaches his ideas in Psychology and Conflict Resolution. I've read a couple of his books and he really talks my language, except of course when he really gets far out there even for me. And he could be right in his "out-thereness" who knows? At any rate, some of the things I resonate to are his concepts around intuition, and the bleed through, so to speak, of a larger consciousness that he sometimes calls the big U. He also believes strongly in something he calls Deep Democracy. Deep Democracy insists upon hearing all points of view to find the big U of a group.

So last night, I got to see all these beliefs in action and wow! how inspiring. There were four main presenters. Then there were about 10 helpers and the teacher. The presenters presented the topic and then fielded questions and comments. The helpers sought out triggered people and helped them on the spot. One woman kept saying inappropriate things, by her body language I guessed something was not quite right, so several helpers immediately came to her side to listen to her quietly and answer her questions in a way that did not disturb the larger group. Another person started crying and tissues appeared. Later two factions began to argue and the students worked to be sure both sides received fair time to say what they wanted. The facilitators also translated shaming language into empathetic language. Every so often one of the facilitators would sum up what was being said, or go over the major themes we had discussed to give us a bird's eye view of what was happening.

I saw a group of fifty people supported, and it really did feel like support, to communicate at the most vulnerable and deep levels. It was like watching a dance; like a dance of emotions. I was so delighted watching the students work. I just knew group process could look this connected. I can't wait to see more.

Peace Week 2011

I received information about a global internet event. Here's the link: peaceweek.info

All kinds of famous speakers will take part. Here's their blurb:

PeaceWeek 2011 – the largest virtual peace telesummit featuring inspiring peacebuilders such as Alice Walker, Deepak Chopra, Marianne Williamson, Arun Gandhi, Michael Bernard Beckwith, Daniel Goleman, Jane Velez-Mitchell and many more.

It’s happening September 15-21 and features groundbreaking sessions and profound insights for creating peace in your life, your family, your community and our world.

You can register for free here: http://peaceweek.info

Department of Motor Vehicles

I need to get an Oregon license. I have to take the drivers test, written portion. So I picked up 110 pages about how to drive in Oregon. I'm pretty sure that the last time I had to take a written test for driving was when I was sixteen. There are many, many more rules now. Plus my test was in North Carolina, a mostly rural state. So there were no rules about subway lines and trolleys.

Oregon also has very interesting rules about pedestrians. Pedestrians have the right of way on any street corner, with the exception of corners with walk lights. If I am driving and a pedestrian is on the corner, I must stop for them even if there are no cross walk lines. This creates really tricky driving. Add to this challenge, bicycles silently coming up the side as I turn right, and you can see how my normal tension driving is now off the charts. I look like one of those toy clock cats that shifts it's wide eyes from side to side as it ticks.

The Sacrifice in Mongolia

Sometimes I hear a story that puts my culture into such stark contrast with another that I am atomized for a moment; my worldview blown apart. Last night I heard such a story.

A storyteller told a story of her trip to Mongolia, where she had the opportunity to live among the nomadic people of the plains for one week. Once she settled into their daily routines, she enjoyed the simplicity and beauty of her surroundings. Everything was made out of wool: the yurt covers, rugs, pillows, blankets, and clothes. She said the smell of sheep was everywhere inside the home and outside with the living herds of sheep. Each night, the family would gather around the grandfather as he told stories.

On the last full day of her stay, the family told her they would have a big good-bye party for her and invite neighboring families. That afternoon, the grandfather motioned her over to him. He had the ewe that had been tied near the yurt with him. Lynn had grown fond of the ewe and had pet her each time she walked past.

The grandfather was stroking the animal and so Lynn began petting her, too. Then he began to sing to her and talk in her ear. He lifted her into his lap and the ewe settled happily into his stroking hands. When she became still from the song and touch, he took out a long knife and slit her belly. She did not move. He continued to sing to her and talk to her and pet her. Then he took Lynn’s hand in his own and reached up into the belly, took the heart and put a gently pressure on it until it stopped beating, all the while singing. Then she and the grandfather worked together to prepare the sheep for the meal later in the day.

She said that it was the most spiritual feeling of connection and gratitude that she had ever felt in her life.

Except for the actual killing and eating of lamb, there is nothing about this story that is similar to my culture. I keep wondering what the world must look like to a people who are so sensitive and attuned to that which completely sustains them. What does that level of gratitude and respect feel like? What is it like to believe in taking time to make a sacred bond when there is no efficient-bottom-line reason to do so? It’s this kind of time, patience, and care that I want so much for people to do with one another. Here are people who are so full of respect; they make time for the feelings and spiritual experience of an ewe. I am humbled. I’m also grateful for their example of the depths we humans are capable of.

Mad Scientists

My son Wolfe just returned to school this fall. I asked him how it went.

"We had to do a group project, but no one listened to my idea. So I just sat around." He told me.

"Who made all the decisions?" I asked.

"The senior."

It's annoying that schools call this a "group" project. I used to be a part of group projects in school just like this one. I really wish that the schools would teach children how to work together instead of just assuming that they know how. Actually, they probably can't teach it, because they don't know either.

What a tragedy, don't you think? To lose the very thing that makes humans so brilliant. We may not be brilliant swimmers like dolphins, or able to fly like cranes, or able to run like a Cheetah, but we are brilliantly creative together. Now I know we are always fed this silly notion that the mad scientist works alone in his or her lone castle in the deep forest. Well, OK, that's Hollywood's image. But we are told this story so often, we actually believe it.

If there are any mad scientists working alone out there, we don't know about them. And probably never will. All famous people, whether they are artists or scientists get where they are because of a brilliant posse of people. First they have to be born into a family in which there are enough sane people to raise them. They must have access to other brilliant people either in a school or by chance. They need someone to help them stay organized, someone who helps publicize their idea, people who aid them in the studio or lab, other people who make the things required for their work, keep house for them and so on. All inventions are group inventions. All art is group art, if you count everything required to get the science or the art out to the rest of us. I have known plenty of amazing artists who have no group to help them and they are unknown. Until they have a group, they will remain unknown. The ability to work with other people makes all the difference.

Rough Draft 9/8/2011

I finished the rough, rough draft of my book a week ago. Whew! I really hope that I am capable of getting it to readable. When I look at it now, it's a bit sobering. How does anyone write a book?

The book reads a little like an out of focus image on a screen. I am hoping that with rewrites I can get it into focus. Since this is my first book, I don't have the confidence of having done it before.

So I am consoling myself with the thought that I can always get a ghost writer.

I really like the information I have. I am writing about how to work together with a group of people and have fun doing it. I have been a part of one group or another for the past 25 years and I have rarely experienced the fun part. The sad thing is, we really could have fun. But most working groups model themselves after business board meetings and/or struggle with conflict. Then they wonder why no one wants to join.

At any rate this is a book offering a completely different way of working, which I hope will inspire people to do groups differently. Just think how it might transform our world if accomplishing something in a group together was a joy rather than a duty.

Too Much to Do 9/7/2011

I have been going over the minutes of an organization and suddenly I had a thought: when people get together to do something they still think of themselves as individuals doing things who happen to belong to the same group.

Over and over again in the minutes, I see reports on what each person is supposed to do. Tommy is going to call all the school art teachers and make a list of supplies needed. Beth is going to talk to the CEO of Arts Are Us and see about getting a discount. Jim will review the website and update the calendar, and so on.

Now let me ask you, does this make you want to join this group? Are you struggling with boredom and need more to do? Exactly, you are busy, I am busy. The last thing we need is more work. Now try this on:

What if the group said, today we will have a "call all teachers and make a list" party. We will have food, music, and time to chat. We will take turns calling a teacher and if we get put on hold or have to call eighty administrators to get the right number, we will vent our frustration by telling jokes (such as making up limericks - there once was a phone number list, as long as my elbow to fist...). Now would you be interested in joining such a group? Especially if they were working together on stuff that you believed in? I would, because it would sound like fun.

The one thing missing in my life is a fun time with a group of people. I'm not missing work! I'm not missing dull meetings. I've had those a plenty. I'm missing fun with other people.

I think there is this thought that if we join together we will get more done as individuals. But I'm beginning to think that we need to think a new way: if we join groups we will get less done, but we will make more friends.

Now, I've known groups that were based on fun. I knew a group in Roanoke, Virginia, where I am originally from, that had a load of fun together. And they also created really fun public events together. That group seemed to grow bigger and bigger. They didn't seem to use each other for maximum efficiency. They saw each other as friends.

Getting back to the organization whose minutes I am reading, their membership is getting smaller. And when I read the minutes, I can see why. What a long, lonely "to do list" each person has. If I could, I'd try to talk them into getting less done by doing the list together.