Category: Uncategorized

Life in a Family without Empathy

How difficult is it to live with family members who are unable to feel empathy for you or each other? I’ve had a series of interesting e-mails from a woman who recently discovered the...

Babies are sociopaths

We all start life as sociopaths. Babies don’t much care that mommy is dead tired from getting up every two hours to feed them. Their cries say it all: “Feed me. Change me. Hold...

The Henry Louis Gates incident

The Henry Louis Gates incident is a situation crying out for an empathetic response. You have to ask yourself, if you are not a person of color, how would it feel to be automatically...

Help Wanted: Supreme Court Justice

Wanted: Supreme Court Justice. Must be empathetic and understanding. President Obama is going to appoint a replacement for David Souter, and his number one criterion for a candidate is empathy! When have you ever...

Children’s Culture Connection

I just read a newspaper article about an amazing organization that is fostering empathy between children of different cultures and countries in wonderful ways. It’s called Children’s Culture Connection. I spent the last hour...

empathy in kids

It was about 10 years ago, when I was volunteering in my son’s 6th grade classroom. It was Ramadan, and one of the girls in his class was wearing a headscarf. I overheard her...

being homeless

I got to experience a little bit of empathy for what it feels like to be homeless recently. My church is part of a group of churches that participate in a program called “Families...

Majority/Minority

It ‘s good to experience being in the minority sometimes, if you are usually of the majority. My childhood experience was as majority as you can get–a WASP in Minnesota in the ’50’s and...

A co-worker shares

I am a teacher. Various in-service opportunities are offered at our school. One day, a co-worker in the administration area of our school offered a diversity in-service workshop on herself–her life as a lesbian....

Obama our brother

On Tuesday, January 20th, we were all brothers and sisters together as Barack Obama became our president. Everywhere, the tears of joy and liberation flowed–from the Washington Mall to the Mall of America, on...