Empathy Warm-Up: Parallel Processing in Empathy Circles. 

Speaker: Yehuda Tagar  (15 min) To Video, Summary, AI, Outline, Full Transcripts 

OTTER.AI Summary 

Yehuda Tagar, an Australian, South African, and Central European counselor and psychotherapist, discussed the history and importance of empathy. He noted that the term "empathy" was coined by Carl Rogers in 1951, though its roots can be traced back to ancient Greek theater. Tagar emphasized the need for self-knowledge to empathize with others, drawing from his experience as an actor and director. He outlined four levels of empathy: reflective, imaginative, inspirative, and methodical. Tagar highlighted the role of empathy in professional counseling and psychotherapy, advocating for a participatory approach. He concluded by stressing the importance of empathy for humanity's future.

Transcript

https://otter.ai/u/uFq-P1vydVTW97R8XPKIGIxODhw?view=transcript

Action Items

• [ ] Start an international online course on empathy.

• [ ] Explore future exchanges between the School of Empathy's efforts in different countries for the development of empathy.

Outline

Introduction of Yehuda Tagar

• Speaker 1 introduces Yehuda, highlighting his diverse background and extensive credentials in counseling, psychotherapy, and organizational development.

• Yehuda is recognized as the founder of psycho phonetics and methodology, and the director of psycho phonetics institutes International.

• He is also co-director and dean of studies at the School of Empathy in Slovakia, the UK, Czechoslovakia, and China.

• Speaker 1 expresses honor in introducing Yehuda to the audience.

Historical Context of Empathy

• Speaker 2 (Yehuda) emphasizes the newness of the empathy movement, noting that the term "empathy" was only introduced in 1951 by Carl Rogers.

• Yehuda clarifies that while related terms like sympathy and antipathy existed, empathy itself is a relatively modern concept.

• He describes empathy as a value for humanity that must be nurtured within oneself.

• Yehuda shares his personal journey of discovering empathy through his career in theater, where understanding oneself deeply was crucial for acting convincingly.

Empathy in Theater and Beyond

• Yehuda explains how his experience in theater taught him the importance of empathy, leading him to apply it beyond the stage.

• He discusses the historical roots of empathy, tracing it back to ancient Greek theater and its evolution over 2000 years.

• Yehuda emphasizes the need to take empathy out of the theater and apply it in various walks of life.

• He mentions the establishment of the School of Empathy in Slovakia and its expansion to other countries like the UK, Czech Republic, China, and South Africa.

Development of Empathy Laboratories

• Yehuda introduces the concept of empathy laboratories as part of their professional training programs.

• He outlines the four levels of empathy: reflective, imaginative, inspirative, and methodical empathy.

• Reflective empathy focuses on understanding what others say, while imaginative empathy delves into their mental pictures.

• Inspirative empathy explores the deep meaning behind words, and methodical empathy involves providing evidence of understanding rather than asking questions.

The Role of Empathy in Counseling

• Yehuda explains how methodical empathy is integrated into professional counseling and psychotherapy.

• He highlights the importance of changing oneself to truly understand and connect with others, moving from normal listening to empathetic listening.

• Empathy involves reflecting, imagining, and feeling another person's experience, as described by Carl Rogers.

• Yehuda emphasizes that empathy is essential for addressing the deepest longings in people's souls and fostering a culture of empathy.

Future of Empathy and Professional Training

• Yehuda discusses the future of empathy and its role in creating an empathic culture for humanity and the planet.

• He mentions the ongoing professional training programs in various countries and the launch of an international online course.

• Yehuda encourages the audience to practice empathy in their daily lives and professional roles.

• He expresses his commitment to the movement for the future of humanity and looks forward to future exchanges and collaborations.

Closing Remarks

• Speaker 1 thanks Yehuda for his inspirational presentation and insights into the history and importance of empathy.

• Yehuda reiterates his dedication to the movement and the potential for global collaboration in developing empathy.

• The conversation concludes with mutual appreciation and a forward-looking perspective on the future of empathy.

Transcript

https://otter.ai/u/uFq-P1vydVTW97R8XPKIGIxODhw?view=transcript
Speaker 1  

I would like to now introduce Yahuda. And along with being an Australian, South African, Central European counselor, psychotherapist, psychosomatic therapist, organizational development consultants and international trainer of all of these, the founder of psycho phonetics and method, methodology, excuse me, methodological and empathy. And he's the director of psycho phonetics institutes International, a co director, Dean of studies at school of empathy in Slovakia, UK, Czechoslovakia, Republic and China. So it's my honor to introduce Yehuda, thank you so much.

Speaker 2  

you go. Can you hear me now? Cool. Well, it's a pleasure to be included in this noble circle of people who are striving for the future of humanity. And as Edwin called it, it's a movement. It's worldwide movement, and it is not a very old one. It's quite a new one. So for context, because I'm also a historian, I want to remind us, if you open any dictionary in the world before 1951 you will not find the value empathy, not even the Oxford Dictionary. 

There was no empathy in the world. It was invented by Carl Rogers in 1951 people think it's an old Greek word. It's not the Greek don't know the word empathy, sympathy, antipathy, sure, empathy, 1951 and it's a baby, and I believe we are all nursing this baby, and we can do it effectively only if we nurse it within ourselves. I discovered empathy, not in psychology, but in theater. I was an actor and a director in England and Australia, and I realized that what it takes in order to become somebody else convincingly as an actor and help out. Tell others to do it as director. 

I have to know myself deeper I affect the same physic, the same biography, the same psyche, the same accent body, and know it so well that I can become you convincingly on the stage, never to be you, but to be as close as possible. So I studied empathy the hard way during my career in theater in England and in Australia, and I graduated in education theater on methodical empathy. And so I realized that this is too important to leave it for schauspielgen, to leave it for the show business. I decided that this is a value for humanity. And in my history study, I realized when empathy started. 

Empathy started officially as a name in 1951 but as a skill. It started in the fifth century BC in Greece, in the theater Dionysus in Athens, when one human being represented another human being for a third human being to watch through the playwright East colos and that's where it started. Took us 2000 years to make it into a skill. I wanted to take it out of theater. I took myself out of theater to develop it together in all walks of life. So we are teaching in school of empathy. I'm speaking now from the school of empathy based in Slovakia. 

We are now teaching it in the UK, in Czech Republic, in China, and in South Africa and in other countries before and we are teaching it professionally. And to give it grounding in cultural reality, I put it in a context of professional training for counselors, psychotherapists, psychosomatic therapies and educational and organizational consultancy. So we train people to be counselors and psychotherapists on the basis of methodical empathy. And I suppose, parallel to the development of empathy circles, we develop the same thing. We call it empathy laboratories, the core element in our training is you know yourself. You know others. You want to know another.

To all this terminology here, we developed four levels of. Empathy, and you have other dictionary, other terms for them, but basically, we take people through reflective empathy, which is the basic level here, what people say, not what you think they say, but we go deeper into imaginative empathy to get into the mental picture, not only the words. Then we take it deeper into inspirative empathy, to go into the deep meaning of what they say, not only what they say. In this process, we have to drop our questions. We don't do questions in empathy. We do evidence. We provide evidence that we hear you rather than

meaning of what your life mean to you and what you encounter mean to you with your partner or your client or your colleague, what it means to you in the context of your life as an evolving human being. So I suppose it could be said that methodical empathy goes parallel with the development of empathy circle and these very many overlapping elements between them, and I believe we can contribute a lot to each other and to our students. We gave it the context of professional counseling and psychotherapy, methodical empathy and the basis for counseling and psychotherapy bring the new dimension to modern psychology for what we call participatory therapy and not a passive reception of therapy.

 The core element is you have to change to move from normal listening. Normal listening is pre empathy, into empathetic listening. I don't just change you. I have to change myself, because in myself, I have the receptor for the deeper dimension of empathy, addressing the deepest longing in people's souls, everyone from baby to anyone else. We want to be seen. We want to be heard. We want to be known. And reflection is only the beginning of it. In order to see you, I need to imagine you. I need to go imaginative. To hear you, I have to take your spirit into me, in spirit of empathy, and feel your experience that if it is mine, that's what you do in acting. In order to know you from inside, I have to be for a moment. 

You as close as I can. And give you mirrors to all these states which results in what car Rogers established says, I have to change. I give you an echo of yourself. You change. And if I change, and you change, then we change, and the future of humanity is empathy, empathic culture. If humanity has empathy, and that goes also for our environment, if humanity and the planet has a future, it is empathetic future. We teach it professionally. 

We ground it in professional counseling. We are teaching it now in Slovakia, in the UK, in Czech Republic, South Africa and China, but we are starting an international course online as well. And so the position of the counselor give you incredible opportunity every day to practice empathy on another level.

 So friends, this is my humble contribution to this honorable movement, as Edwin call it. We are in a movement for the future of humanity, but that future is now. We do now the future, and I'm very glad to be a part of this movement, and I'm looking forward for many future exchanges between our efforts in different countries for the development of that future humanity. Right now, that is my contribution.

Speaker 1  

My goodness. Thank you so much, Yahuda, and that's very inspirational, going into the history of you know, empathy like it didn't exist really. What an idea, what a thought that. Yeah, methodical empathy. Thank you so much for that. Yeah.

Transcribed by https://otter.ai