Thanks for the video, Natalia (I also enjoy RSA videos). At the risk of seeming that I lack compassion (I hope not!), I have some thoughts on it. :)
To me it seems like Brené Brown is conflating empathy with compassion and/or understanding, and is completely mis-defining sympathy in order to prop up empathy as a better alternative. (This makes me think this is a technique for argumentative fallacy, maybe "reverse straw man"? "Begging the question"?) Specifically, these are the example conversations she uses for sympathy: - "I just had a miscarriage." - "At least you know you can get pregnant." - "I think my marriage is falling apart." - "At least you have a marriage." - "John is getting kicked out of school." - "At least he is an A-student." I'm not sure that sounds like sympathy to me (wiktionary defines sympathy <https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/sympathy> and empathy as basically the same thing, where the former is weaker than the latter). Is a silver lining the defining aspect of sympathy? In any case, the risk expressed in the article I linked is <http://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/when_empathy_hurts_compassion_can_heal> that empathizing can lead to poorer decision-making (bias) and emotional burnout on the part of the empathizer: > Negative emotions did not disappear after the loving-kindness training; > it’s just that the participants were less likely to feel distressed > themselves. According to Klimecki and her colleagues, this suggests that > the training allowed participants to stay in touch with the negative > emotion from a calmer mindset. “Compassion is a good antidote,” says > Klimecki. “It allows us to connect to others’ suffering, without being too > distressed.” > > The main takeaway is that we can shape our own emotional reactions, and > can alter the way we feel and respond to certain situations. In other > words, says Klimecki, “Our emotions are not set in stone.” > On Thu, Feb 23, 2017 at 3:09 PM, Natalia Harateh <nhara...@wikimedia.org> wrote: > Thanks for sharing, Max! I’ll definitely read the article. If I can add to > the discussion, here’s a short 2:53 min video explaining empathy in a way > that resonated with me <https://youtu.be/1Evwgu369Jw>. > > TL;DR: > > *What is the best way to ease someone's pain and suffering? In this > beautifully animated RSA Short, Dr Brené Brown reminds us that we can only > create a genuine empathic connection if we are brave enough to really get > in touch with our own fragilities.* > > On 23 Feb 2017, at 23:53, Max Binder <mbin...@wikimedia.org> wrote: > > I ran across an article claiming that empathizing with others on their > issues can be a slippery slope to bias, or at the very least unnecessary > absorption of another person's issues and feelings. The article was > political in nature, so I won't post it, but it did make some claims that I > thought to research. > > That let me to this article on compassion as an alternative to empathy: > http://greatergood.berkeley.edu/article/item/when_empathy_ > hurts_compassion_can_heal > > I can't attest for the reputation of the site linked, but it makes some > interesting arguments. I thought those arguments might be relevant since we > often operate in an environment with, and espouse values using, words like > "empathy." > > TL;DR: > > we can better cope with others’ negative emotions by strengthening our own >> compassion skills, which the researchers define as “feeling concern for >> another’s suffering and desiring to enhance that individual’s welfare.” >> “Empathy is really important for understanding others’ emotions very >> deeply, but there is a downside of empathy when it comes to the suffering >> of others,” says Olga Klimecki, a researcher at the Max Planck Institute >> for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences in Germany and the lead author of >> the study. “When we share the suffering of others too much, our negative >> emotions increase. It carries the danger of an emotional burnout.” >> > _______________________________________________ > teampractices mailing list > teampractices@lists.wikimedia.org > https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/teampractices > > > > _______________________________________________ > teampractices mailing list > teampractices@lists.wikimedia.org > https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/teampractices > >
_______________________________________________ teampractices mailing list teampractices@lists.wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/teampractices