Americans have long been seen as distinctly willing to volunteer their time to build society and connect with each other in common cause. In his 1835 book Democracy in America, Alexis de Tocqueville wrote about how inhabitants of the United States would “seek each other out and unite together once they have made contact” to promote an idea or opinion. In the process, “they are no longer isolated but have become a power.” I don’t think we need to delve too deeply into the 19th century (or even the 18th century when Benjamin Franklin started a volunteer fire department) to find examples of Americans devoting their time, energy and resources to make life better.
In my own family, I have seen everything from volunteering time to encourage voting, to marching against war and for racial justice, to raising awareness door-to-door about the environment, to delivering food for the homeless, to gathering books and clothes for families in need, to going room-to-room with a beloved dog to spread cheer among sick hospital patients. This is not only about what we can do for others, it’s also about what those experiences can teach us—indeed, how we build empathy on the way to driving change. Decades ago I had the opportunity to teach reading and writing to inmates in a Philadelphia prison; it’s hard to overstate how much I learned from my time among those men whose misfortune or wrong choices had led them there.
This brings me to this weekend’s question: How can we build empathy and drive positive change? The need for this has always been there, but it feels particularly urgent these days. Please share your thoughts—and please do share your own experiences donating time, energy or money to touch the lives of others and make things better. As always, let’s be respectful of each other here.
If you like what you are reading and believe in the value of building this community, I hope that you will consider becoming a paid subscriber for $5 a month or $50 a year.
My Mama taught me that helping others can be a natural act. Before she passed, she wrote us all a letter. In her letter to me, she wrote that I was a very generous person. I never thought of it that way, and it made a difference in how I looked at myself. By giving, that means the simple act of calling someone in need or going out in the community to volunteer. In Deepak Chopra's book, The Seven Spiritual Laws of Success, he cites to give someone a gift daily. For me, that is letting someone go ahead of me in traffic, complimenting a stranger about something they are wearing that is unique, even just smiling with a twinkle in your eye (masked!) Giving is natural for a lot of us. I highly recommend the little gifts we can give. You can truly makes another person's day. And, eventually, you change yourself.
I think empathy and compassion are something you're born with. It can be developed over our lifetimes, or squelched, depending on circumstances. I really don't think there's anything to be done about the lack of empathy from Republicans in general and former guy supporters, more specifically. Their hate, fear and racism has completely taken them over, and it is a waste of time to try to reason with them. I prefer to spend my time and energy on helping and encouraging, when I can. I have an abundance of empathy, to the point that it's physically and emotionally painful to witness all of the cruelty and lies going on, right now. I have donated money to my local food shelf and restaurants that have been helping to feed people during this pandemic. I've protested and attending silent vigils with my local resistance group. I am kind to people, but, I do not put up with bullshit. I'm hoping that this season that we're in will eventually run it's course, without too much more damage to our country, but, I'm also realistic enough to know, that we are hanging by a thread right now, and the GQP is holding the scissors.
Unless the perpetrators of the big lie come clean and tell the truth we are truly in deep trouble as a country. I do what I can in my little spot of the world, but the problems seem overwhelming. I’m retired and volunteer my time to a children’s feeding program and I donate to many charities.
As a child I was taught to consider how what I do affects the people around me. In addition my mother encouraged me to do what she called “good works.” I can remember her telling me that ladies kept a journal (diary) and volunteered in the community in which they lived. If this sounds a bit old-fashioned it’s because it was.
You see, my mother spent a great deal of time with her grandmother when she was a child. In fact my mother referred to her grandmother as “mama.” (This was very confusing to me when I was a child.) My great grandmother was born in 1881, so a lot of how I was brought up came from my great grandmother’s era.
The upshot of it was that I began doing volunteer work as a young child. It consisted mainly of me going door to door in my neighborhood collecting change for various causes. I collected change for City of Hope for several years. I also sorted used clothing given to the YWCA and at a shelter for school-age girls who couldn’t live with their families for one reason or another.
When I was in my early twenties I became a registered nurse.This was in the mid-1970s when nurses were expected to do the math to figure out dosages and drop-rates for IVs. IV pumps were a brand new piece of equipment we barely knew how to use. As you can probably imagine working as an RN in a hospital setting offers endless opportunities to exercise compassion & kindness. I started out working in a small community hospital that had roughly 40 beds.
One day the nursing supervisor told me I was assigned to work in the ER. Since I had only been licensed for about 3 months I told her I wasn’t ready, especially because in this tiny hospital I would be the only nurse, in fact the only person, in the ER which was at the other end of the hospital from where the nurses and nursing assistants were.
My fears fell on deaf ears. The supervisor literally grabbed my arm and marched me down a very long hallway to the ER and then left. This was at the beginning of the 3-11 pm shift. At that time, most of the Dr.s we used in the ER were residents at either the Houston Medical Center or the Galveston, Texas University hospital. They left their shift at those hospitals and drove to the Houston suburb where I worked, arriving at about 6pm.
So when people came to that ER it was just me and one Dr. who was already tired from working all day. What I experienced there for the next 2-3 years was extraordinary and unforgettable. People might think not much happens in a rural backwater, but we got patients with every health emergency you can imagine. We had gunshot wounds to the chest, heart attacks galore, auto and motorcycle crashes with severe head injuries and shards of glass in the eyes, women about to give birth, chemical burns from Houston refineries, drunk teens, suicidal teens, traumatic accidents from farm equipment, drug overdoses, migrant workers drunk & bleeding from bar brawls, long-haul truck drivers hopped up on amphetamines and a nice man who had just been discharged from the state hospital for the mentally challenged who was brought in by his daughter because he wanted to kill his wife.
I could go on, but I won’t. Throughout all of my experiences as a nurse I felt that it was my job to advocate for the patient. That didn’t endear me to some of the local physicians who tended to be “old school” about the role of nurses, but I was young and fearless.
When Covid came to America and so many people refused to wear masks because it “infringed on their freedom” I often thought that if they could observe the patients who were struggling to breathe they would surely change their minds. But it has become a cult of selfishness that has gone on so long that I’ve changed my mind. I agree with the others writing here who say that either you’re born with it or trained as a young child to have compassion for others.
Despite my advanced age I have never seen an unempathetic, difficult person develop empathy. However I've seen it in a film - 12 Angry Men. This 1957 film is well worth hunting down and watching, as it illustrates how with certain angry/cynical/hate-filled people, the mere act of listening to them can lead to change. (However, this only works if the pump has been primed in some way. I very much doubt it would work with any Republican senators or others with a long track record of showing no regard for anyone less fortunate.) Actor Lee J. Cobb was amazing in this movie, playing the last holdout on the jury, voting for the death penalty in the case because of his own unresolved issues with his son. In the 1997 remake, George C. Scott won two awards in this same role.
My Mama taught me that helping others can be a natural act. Before she passed, she wrote us all a letter. In her letter to me, she wrote that I was a very generous person. I never thought of it that way, and it made a difference in how I looked at myself. By giving, that means the simple act of calling someone in need or going out in the community to volunteer. In Deepak Chopra's book, The Seven Spiritual Laws of Success, he cites to give someone a gift daily. For me, that is letting someone go ahead of me in traffic, complimenting a stranger about something they are wearing that is unique, even just smiling with a twinkle in your eye (masked!) Giving is natural for a lot of us. I highly recommend the little gifts we can give. You can truly makes another person's day. And, eventually, you change yourself.
I think empathy and compassion are something you're born with. It can be developed over our lifetimes, or squelched, depending on circumstances. I really don't think there's anything to be done about the lack of empathy from Republicans in general and former guy supporters, more specifically. Their hate, fear and racism has completely taken them over, and it is a waste of time to try to reason with them. I prefer to spend my time and energy on helping and encouraging, when I can. I have an abundance of empathy, to the point that it's physically and emotionally painful to witness all of the cruelty and lies going on, right now. I have donated money to my local food shelf and restaurants that have been helping to feed people during this pandemic. I've protested and attending silent vigils with my local resistance group. I am kind to people, but, I do not put up with bullshit. I'm hoping that this season that we're in will eventually run it's course, without too much more damage to our country, but, I'm also realistic enough to know, that we are hanging by a thread right now, and the GQP is holding the scissors.
Unless the perpetrators of the big lie come clean and tell the truth we are truly in deep trouble as a country. I do what I can in my little spot of the world, but the problems seem overwhelming. I’m retired and volunteer my time to a children’s feeding program and I donate to many charities.
I also recall the internal three doors
slamming shut upon one entering the old Jefferson City MO State Penitentiary during a brief outreach, being chilling to one's soul.
Abolition of police-stop 🚓🚨, jail time slavery is as necessary as the abolition of jail time slavery for small amounts of cannabis, under one kilo.
Check out:
www.cannaconvicts.com
As a child I was taught to consider how what I do affects the people around me. In addition my mother encouraged me to do what she called “good works.” I can remember her telling me that ladies kept a journal (diary) and volunteered in the community in which they lived. If this sounds a bit old-fashioned it’s because it was.
You see, my mother spent a great deal of time with her grandmother when she was a child. In fact my mother referred to her grandmother as “mama.” (This was very confusing to me when I was a child.) My great grandmother was born in 1881, so a lot of how I was brought up came from my great grandmother’s era.
The upshot of it was that I began doing volunteer work as a young child. It consisted mainly of me going door to door in my neighborhood collecting change for various causes. I collected change for City of Hope for several years. I also sorted used clothing given to the YWCA and at a shelter for school-age girls who couldn’t live with their families for one reason or another.
When I was in my early twenties I became a registered nurse.This was in the mid-1970s when nurses were expected to do the math to figure out dosages and drop-rates for IVs. IV pumps were a brand new piece of equipment we barely knew how to use. As you can probably imagine working as an RN in a hospital setting offers endless opportunities to exercise compassion & kindness. I started out working in a small community hospital that had roughly 40 beds.
One day the nursing supervisor told me I was assigned to work in the ER. Since I had only been licensed for about 3 months I told her I wasn’t ready, especially because in this tiny hospital I would be the only nurse, in fact the only person, in the ER which was at the other end of the hospital from where the nurses and nursing assistants were.
My fears fell on deaf ears. The supervisor literally grabbed my arm and marched me down a very long hallway to the ER and then left. This was at the beginning of the 3-11 pm shift. At that time, most of the Dr.s we used in the ER were residents at either the Houston Medical Center or the Galveston, Texas University hospital. They left their shift at those hospitals and drove to the Houston suburb where I worked, arriving at about 6pm.
So when people came to that ER it was just me and one Dr. who was already tired from working all day. What I experienced there for the next 2-3 years was extraordinary and unforgettable. People might think not much happens in a rural backwater, but we got patients with every health emergency you can imagine. We had gunshot wounds to the chest, heart attacks galore, auto and motorcycle crashes with severe head injuries and shards of glass in the eyes, women about to give birth, chemical burns from Houston refineries, drunk teens, suicidal teens, traumatic accidents from farm equipment, drug overdoses, migrant workers drunk & bleeding from bar brawls, long-haul truck drivers hopped up on amphetamines and a nice man who had just been discharged from the state hospital for the mentally challenged who was brought in by his daughter because he wanted to kill his wife.
I could go on, but I won’t. Throughout all of my experiences as a nurse I felt that it was my job to advocate for the patient. That didn’t endear me to some of the local physicians who tended to be “old school” about the role of nurses, but I was young and fearless.
When Covid came to America and so many people refused to wear masks because it “infringed on their freedom” I often thought that if they could observe the patients who were struggling to breathe they would surely change their minds. But it has become a cult of selfishness that has gone on so long that I’ve changed my mind. I agree with the others writing here who say that either you’re born with it or trained as a young child to have compassion for others.
Despite my advanced age I have never seen an unempathetic, difficult person develop empathy. However I've seen it in a film - 12 Angry Men. This 1957 film is well worth hunting down and watching, as it illustrates how with certain angry/cynical/hate-filled people, the mere act of listening to them can lead to change. (However, this only works if the pump has been primed in some way. I very much doubt it would work with any Republican senators or others with a long track record of showing no regard for anyone less fortunate.) Actor Lee J. Cobb was amazing in this movie, playing the last holdout on the jury, voting for the death penalty in the case because of his own unresolved issues with his son. In the 1997 remake, George C. Scott won two awards in this same role.