Pascal Gemperli from CoPeSe interviews Edwin Rutsch
.
Edwin Rutsch from the Center for Building a Culture of Empathy presents
the Empathy Circles and how this method can be used to foster dialogue and
transform conflict.
Before we talk about the approach, Edwin talks about himself, his life
experiences and career and how the heck he ended up as an American soldier in
Vietnam!
We talk about the philosophical grounding of Empathy Circles such as Carl
Rogers and other relevant references such as John-Paul Lederach or Johan
Galtung, and we develop ideas such as Jean-Jacques Rousseau's idea that humans
are naturally good.
Edwin presents how the method works and shares practical examples such as
Occupy Wallstreet, right-wing - left-wing dialogue, police-community dialogue,
etc.
In the end, Edwin explains how to join the Mouvement and become an
Empathy Circles facilitator yourself!
Edwin Rutsch is founder of the
Culture of Empathy and has spent the last couple of decades spreading empathy,
helping to bridge social and political divides. He has built an academic
empathy training literature database, and has launched himself as a
politician. In this conversation, we discuss his journey, his driving purpose,
the value of empathy in life and politics, the Empathy Circle that he
co-created with Lidewij Niezink, his Empathy Tent actions and much more.
For our July 13th Empathy Power Up! we'll be joined by Edwin Rutsch, the
founder of the Center for Building a Culture of Empathy. We'll talk about his
life's work and get to model an Empathy Circle, which Edwin teaches to
hundreds of people each year! Edwin Rutsch is the founding director of the
Center for Building a Culture of Empathy.
The center's website, CultureOfEmpathy.com, is the internet's most
comprehensive portal for empathy-related material. It hosts many empathy
building projects including interviews with over 300 experts on the topic,
trainings and the Empathy Tent. The Tent goes to public events and offers
listening, facilitated dialogue and conflict mediation.
His
current focus is on developing an online Empathy Circle Facilitation Training
Course and Massive Open Online Course (MOOC). From his experience, the Empathy
Circle process is the most effective gateway and first step practice for
learning, practicing and deepening empathic listening skills and mindset.
:
A conversation with Edwin Rutsch, Center for Building a Culture of
Empathy on Soapbox Derby - the call-in political talk show on KALX 90.7
FM, which airs every other Thursday from 9:00 to 9:30 PM and streams
online at kalx.berkeley.edu
Peter Limberg
- Empathy Circles 'a good conversational modality for memetic mediators to have
in their toolkit.'
John Vervaeke
- Psychology and Cognitive Science Professor | Integrating
science and spirituality to solve the meaning crisis
Jason Snyder
- I found the Empathy Circle format to be a very useful 'enabling
constraint' encouraging a dynamic interplay between co-presence, theory,
and embodied/intuitive processing. Thanks guys!
Edwin Rutsch
- Director Center for Building a Culture of Empathy
EMPATHY CIRCLE
What is an Empathy Circle? An Empathy Circle is a structured dialogue
process that effectively supports meaningful and constructive dialogue.
Peter Limberg of the Intellectual Explorers Podcast and
Edwin Rutsch discuss the nature of Edwin's Empathy Circle process. We
discuss the origin of the practice, examples, the how to, upcoming events
and more.
For over 4 decades New Dimensions has been gleaning experience and
inspiration from some of the world's most innovative,
enlightened, and trustworthy wisdom leaders as it sows the seeds of
encouragement and confidence that, together, we can meet the challenges
of the 21st Century.
Topics Explored in This Dialogue
What is the history of the concept of empathy
What is the difference between empathy and sympathy
What are some physical traits we can cultivate to
establish empathy with another
What is an example of connecting with a neighbor of a
different political persuasion
How developing empathy is a gateway practice like
developing a muscle
What is the process used in the Empathy Cafes both
on-line and in person
How Rutsch set up an Empathy Tent at a Berkeley political
rally
Why it is important to repeat back to the person what
they have said without having to agree with them...
Edwin Rutsch is the founding director of the Center for Building a Culture
of Empathy and the founder of the International Empathy Trainers
Association. The center's website, CultureOfEmpathy.com, is
the internet's most comprehensive portal for empathy-related material,
including interviews with over 300 experts on the topic.
He is a world traveler, a "seeker," a documentary filmmaker and has worked
in the computer technology field. In his travels, he has interacted with a
wide variety of cultures and peoples from all walks of life and learned to
see and feel the common humanity of all people on the planet.
Hi Edwin,
I am delighted we'll be conversing with the council today at
1pmPST....and wanted to share with you the general idea I have of where
we might go.... After I say a few words of welcome and
etc, I'll introduce you and would love to start with:
1. What brought you to create the Center
for Building a Culture of Empathy and to devote your time to this
project?
Special stories? Personal?
Otherwise? What has informed your journey to offer such a valuable
service and hub for the world?
Personal with Family - argued, but now try to empathize and advocate
for a culture of empathy.
2. What do you see happening with Justice right now?
Obama and a supreme court justice that has empathy
3. What is Restorative justice, or restorative practices, to you?
What elements does it embody that retributive justice does not?
4. How do empathy and restorative practices interconnect?
5. How does virtual technology support this movement and its
implementation?
6. Tell us all about the Restorative Empathy Circles
(including how people might get involved, what you've seen thus far,
i.e, with Republican Democrat circles, etc)
Rob Kall is host of the
Bottom-Up Radio Show
(WNJC 1360AM) and publisher
OpEdNews.com.
He is a
blogger with over 100 articles on Huffingtonpost. OpEdNews.com is a tough
progressive website, supporting values that are really dead center
American, like fairness, democracy, justice, protection of our national
resources and commons, and preferring to support humans and America before
corporations and religions. He interviews,
Edwin Rutsch, who is founding director of the Center for
Building a Culture of Empathy.
In
our final episode of the series Conflict and Empathy: Where
Has Empathy and Compassion Gone? Keiko
Krahnke from the
University of Colorado will join me and Edwin
Rutsch, Center for Building a Culture of Empathy to discuss how
do we foster empathy in a business, work and beyond?
We will also look at the larger social systems and see how we
can build a truly global culture of empathy. Sub
Conferences:Workplace
In our third episode of the series Conflict and
Empathy: Where Has Empathy and Compassion Gone? Edwin Rutsch,
Center for Building a Culture of Empathy and I will discuss how
do we foster empathy in a family? Edwin will share some personal
stories of how he has personally fostered empathy in his
extended family and how he used Restorative Empathy Circles to
heal family conflicts.
Sub Conference: Home & Family
In our
second episode of the series Conflict and Empathy: Where Has
Empathy and Compassion Gone?, Edwin Rutsch and I will discuss
how do we build empathy and compassion? Edwin will discuss a
number of strategies he has implemented at the Center for
Building a Culture of Empathy. One strategy has been the use of
Empathy Circles using empathic reflective listening with
individuals and groups. He will share real life examples and
will model the skill.
For
many of us engaged in conflict or embroiled in a dispute, it can
be very difficult to muster up empathy and compassion for the
other side. The longer the conflict goes unresolved it seems
the less empathy we have for them as a human being. In this first
of our four episode series–Conflict and Empathy: Where Has Empathy
and Compassion Gone?– we will introduce the "wheel of empathy" and
the "feel of empathy" as
defined by Edwin Rutsch,
Founder of a global empathy movement called The Center for
Building a Culture of Empathy. We will also discuss how
compassion intertwines with empathy and set the foundation for how
you build empathy.
Questions
Let's start by sharing with listeners
about how you got started in this work of building a culture of
empathy and creating the Center.
Given that this is the first episode in our
series Conflict and Empathy, let's set the stage and define some
of these concepts.
What exactly is empathy and the intention
behind it?
How is empathy different from sympathy?
How does compassion intertwine with empathy?
We said that we would introduce two concepts…the
"wheel of empathy" and the "feel of empathy." What is important
to know about these concepts?
How do these wheels
tie into the Empathy Circles you host through Google Hangouts?
