EMPATHY SUMMIT
Saturday, November 2, 2024

 Exploring Empathy Circles:  
The Foundational Practice of the
 Empathy Movement

Summit Description: Experienced practitioners delve into the essence of the Empathy Circle practice, elucidating its significance as the cornerstone and entry point of the Empathy Movement. The practice is based in mutual Active Listening. Speakers discuss; 

Join us in this community of practice. 


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Date: Saturday, November 2, 2024

Time: 9 am PT to 12:30 pm PT  - World Times

Location: Zoom https://zoom.us/j/9896109339  
RECORDING:   Part of the event will be recorded and posted to social media for educational and promotional purposes. You have an option of being in a non recorded breakout group. 


INVITE FRIENDS

Video Timecode

Host: Ruth Cook

00:00 -  Introduction (10 min) 

04:00 - Edwin Rutsch - The history of the Empathy Circles development.

26:25 - Rasha Kutty - Three Years of Weekly Empathy Circles - Reflections and Learnings 

37:27 - Lou Zweier - Why the deceptively simple structure of the Empathy Circle is so effective

47:27 - Janna Weiss -  Building Empathic Community: An Empathy Circle Superpower 


57:22  Host: Cara Jean Wilson

58:10 - Speaker: Anita Nowak -  Empathic Listening for Inner Development and Outer Impact

1:07:43  - Speaker: Maria Ross  - What role can empathy circles play in a corporate environment? 

1:17:30 - Bill Filler - You can’t understand the Empathy circle unless you experience it

1:26:10 - Rob Volpe - The Importance of Listening in the 5 Steps to Empathy 

1:37:01 - Bob Brown - Why Empathy Circles Are So Effective 

1:42:46 - Annette Dubreui - Adding Focusing to Empathy Circles


1:54:35  - Empathy Circle  Introduction Host: Janna Weiss


2:02:28 - Empathy Circle: Facilitated by Edwin Rutsch

2:59:23 - Debrief: Janna Weiss

3:22:26  - Closing  Edwin Rutsch



HOSTING TEAM AND SPEAKERS 

Program: Saturday, November 2, 2024

All times are Pacific Time

9:00 am PT  Introduction (10 min)

Host: Ruth Cook



9:10 Speaker: Edwin Rutsch (20 min)




9:30 Speaker: Rasha Kutty (10 min)



9:40  Speaker:  Lou Zweier (10 min)



9:50  Speaker: Janna Weiss 


 

10:00 am PT 

Host: Cara Jean Wilson

10:00 am Speaker: Anita Nowak  (10 min)

  


10:10 am Speaker: Maria Ross   (10 min)



10:20 Speaker: Bill Filler (10 min)


10:30 am Speaker: Rob Volpe  (10 min)


 
10:40 am Speaker: Bob Brown   (10 min)


10:50 am Speaker: Annette Dubreui  (10 min)

11 am PT:  Empathy Circle - 90 min

Empathy Circle Host: Janna Weiss
A 90 min participatory dialogue using the Empathy Circle process.

How to Empathy Circle   (10 min) 

Empathy Circle (1:00 hr)  

Debrief (15 min)  

Next Steps: (2 min) Edwin Rutsch

Closing

> Please save your chat.

> fill out the Empathy Summit Feedback Form
https://bit.ly/SummitNov2Feedback

> See The Empathy Center website for updates
https://TheEmpathyCenter.org 

> Next Empathy Summit  is January 4: 
https://www.empathysummit.com/dates/Nov-2-2024-Empathy-Circles

> Next Empathy Circle Facilitation Training in Santa Barbara Jan 16/17
https://www.bestempathytraining.com

> See Schedule for Empathy Circles Worldwide 
https://www.empathycircle.com/schedule

FEEDBACK

Why are you interested in taking part in this Empathy Summit? 




What topics would you suggest for future Summits? 


Share any feedback about your experience in todays Summit? 


The Empathy Summit debrief highlighted the positive experiences of participants in the empathy circles. Attendees shared their gratitude and insights, emphasizing the depth of connection and shared experiences. Key themes included the value of empathy in workplaces, the resonance of shared feelings, and the importance of listening and being heard. Newcomers to empathy circles expressed appreciation for the learning and personal growth. The summit underscored the potential of empathy circles in conflict resolution, problem-solving, and fostering a more empathetic society. Edwin Rutsch emphasized the need for continued efforts to build a more empathic culture.



Based on the context provided, here are some key learnings and insights from the Empathy Summit that can be applied to future events:




Outline


Speaker 2  1:01  

Okay, so welcome back. Thank you for staying for this empathy circle part it is, I think, as wonderful as the presentations are the very best part of the empathy Summit, and we'd love to hear about your experience in the empathy circles. So please share, take 30 seconds. How was your experience in the empathy circle? And let me see there are 25 of us here. So if it's alright, I'll call on you. Is that alright? Yeah, let me change my view so I can see everyone.


Annette Dubreuil  2:18  

I'm Annette, oh, Annette, Annette and Anita. Slightly different pronunciation. That's why I was confused. Okay. So lovely to be here today. Great to hear how focusing, sorry. Empathy circles are coming into workplaces. That was really exciting to hear, and I look forward to learning more about that work. And my experience in the empathy circle was great. We got we had a lot of resonance of similar shared experiences. And it was we had a couple themes, and we were talking a bit, quite a bit, about why one might be tired with this work, and that was really interesting. So thank you.


Ingrid Hirtz  3:06 
Yes, I'm super excited to see Maria Theresa here, and also Janet. It's really great. I love those. And Jesse. Love to see you here too. There was in the circle, there was in a short time, really, some great depth that we reached. And this was quite touching. And that's it. Thank you.


Speaker 4  3:47 
hank you. I'm so happy in this summit. The first time I attend this empathy summit, I had so much to learn from everybody. Thank you all for sharing and answered a lot of question I have on this empathy circle, and I learned the rich history of empathy circle, and I'm really encouraged in this past the learning. It's still learning curve for me, and I'm so grateful for everybody's participation and supporting. Thank you all.


Speaker 5  4:32  

Oh, yes, I thought it was very valuable to hear everybody and then to have the opportunity to express myself so enriching and very worthwhile to get the different viewpoints people and yet realize how much we have in common that we're really not that different. So thank you and bless you for. Putting this vent on. Appreciate it.


Speaker 7  5:36  

it is my first time in an empathy circle. So I learned a lot as to how to, you know, go through the different roles. And appreciated all the participants in my group very much. And also, you know, I'm also very thankful for just this experience and all of everyone who's putting this on and look forward to, you know, looking more into this, into the future. So all the different ways that all the speakers are using the tools I love that and just have a great hope for how this can impact humanity, which we really need it right now.


Speaker 8  6:33  

This is a learning experience. I there's some incredible people there i i wish they were in my circle of life, right where I am now, but, but thank you for sharing.


Speaker 9  7:01  

I feel just filled with gratitude that this is still going on. I'm so grateful to you, Edwin and the whole team. Yeah, I'm a bit I'm an NBC practitioner for many, many years, since the early 90s, and so this is just right up my alley, very parallel to my my deepest values. And so I'm thrilled to, once in a while, be able to be a part, and I'd like to hopefully get more involved and be more of a part. Thank you to everybody. You're all remarkable people. To me. Thank you.


Speaker 10  7:43  

A tremendous amount of gratitude. I'm a disciple of NVC, of nonviolent communication. Have always been in thrall with the process, and this seems like a logical avenue to continue the growth in that area and so very grateful to Ingrid, who sent me the email and invited me and all the wonderful work she and Daniel have been doing, and just very grateful and hopefully and eager to learn more and a lot of hope, a lot of hope. So thank you.


Speaker 11  8:26  

Oh so much gratitude to this and everyone here just we are the change. You know, if we tell two friends, and they tell two friends, pretty soon, everybody will be able to preach or experience this sort of change within ourselves and within each other. So thank you, Edwin for the empathy circles, and look forward to doing more.


Speaker 12  9:08  

Well, thank you for unmuting me. I'm very grateful too, because I trained with Edwin way back and then participated for some time with the extinction rebellion empathy circles. But I think they stopped for a while, and this is my first one. And again, I'm always filled with dread that I won't get things right when I've got I'm on the spectrum and ADHD, so listening is one of my biggest fears. Oh gosh, thank you. Co host Cara Jean, so you probably understand how it is. It's really hard, especially when people start talking about quantum physics. It's really blinking, really hard. Oh, God. Anyway, it was nice to meet some other humans. And no seriously, who being human, being human for. Me is having compassion, and there's so little of it in the world. And thank heavens for these kind of circles. Thank


Speaker 13  10:23  

yes, here we are. Yes, I am a lot more relaxed than I was a few hours ago. I was great to speak to Jonathan again, and to me Tara, and to be able to interact with people that actually listen.


Speaker 14  11:05  

thank you very much. This is my second time, and I feel like having knowledge I need and and I feel listened and even listening to other. Thank you very much.


Speaker 15  11:47  

again, deep appreciation and gratitude, and I will go back and listen to the parts I missed the first hour. But this always brings it back to my own self, honesty and the need, not only for compassion for self and others, with empathy, but also courage to change. I feel that, or it's not even feeling this mirrors this work, mirrors my my patterns of relinquishing control and also being open to something that takes a lot of courage in terms of trust when there is a power imbalance. So it starts with empathy, absolutely and hearing others and being heard. But there's another step that I'm seeing. It takes a bit of courage, and that's a mystery about the next piece of it, when things don't change in our culture or with people who have more power. So I appreciate the practice immensely and just pondering on the next stage of it. Thank you.


Speaker 16  13:17 
so Wow, I shared in my circle, Edwin, that I haven't been in one of these circles in, I don't know, 10 or more years, and so grateful to you and this community for continuing to do this in the world that we so need it. This was a really rich experience for me to be in a pure empathy circle, because I've been doing NVC for like, 20 years, and I kept making guesses instead of just reflecting. And I love this practice. I love it. We so need this, and I'm so grateful. Thank you so much to my group, to the circle, to all of you.



Speaker 17  14:30  

Okay, sorry, I couldn't do it technically. Yeah. Thank you for creating these empathy circles, and it has been a wonderful experience also to be at this summit, and also, thanks to all the participants, especially in our empathy circles. Circle, we were blessed to have two musicians, and we also shared that music is a great way to feel interconnectedness and also a way of empathy somehow because it bridges people.



Speaker 13  15:10  

I really enjoyed the small circle I was in, and I feel that it was a refreshing, you know, change of pace to be heard by people that actually intend to listen.



Daniel Hirtz  15:47  

Okay, this I really enjoyed the connection. And what I continuously like, what I enjoy so much is that we can connect with each other so quickly. I don't know you, but, and yet, I feel so connected to you. And this gives me tremendous hope. You know, I feel like all of us, all of humanity, just needs to turn into that, and we'll be good, you know, okay, if we, if we can unleash that empathetic wave.



Speaker 18  16:33  

hi, thanks very much. Jenna, yeah, I want to thank everybody in the the empathy circle that we had. I was in the circle with Danielle, Daniel playing the drums, and Craig, who is also a musician, and showed his music piece. Thank you for your patience, everybody. Yeah, I really look forward to joining you all again in this process. Thank you very much. Thank you.


Speaker 19  17:24 
I really want to thank Kara for having me here. I really feel seen and heard, and is just really a great experience to be a part of. And I learned so much more about empathy, and this should be really taught around the world in schools, businesses and governments and things. So I really appreciate this. Thank you.



Speaker 20  17:55  

an amazing gathering of people, everyone focusing as hard as possible to listen, I want to thank Edwin for his and just endless work To keep the movement going, and Eugenia and of course, Bill is hilarious. I'm just gonna let other people talk.


Speaker 8  18:55  

So just want to extend my gratitude to Edwin for this amazing process that has been has changed my life for the better. I enjoyed our our circle Today, and every opportunity I have, me present in an empathy circle, I too, hope that schools empathy circles become part of the curriculum in schools so that children can learn to hear, really hear what's being said, and not be reactive and respond. I think it could save lives, and I really would like to see more circles everywhere, globally, so I'm certainly promoting them so, and I look forward to our next summit. Thank you.


Jonathan Gordon  20:02  

well, thank you. Well, we had a lovely empathy circle, and my two participants I was hosting just resonated. They were sharing their frustration with modernity, actually, with politics, and I just felt like it was just, I'm not alone because I've it was just so lovely knowing that other people kind of feel the frustration I feel, and I'll just leave it at that. Thank you.


Bill Filler  20:51  

Sure, I just appreciate everybody being here and, you know, taking the initiative to, you know, engage in empathy and and also spread it. It's a great a great medicine compared to what I'm getting on media. Thank you.


Unknown Speaker  21:30  

okay, I finally got unmuted there. Yeah, it was a wonderful circle. I really like what Jeanette was saying about there's always a learning process, and there's always room for growth. And this concept of being in a circle and the process being simple, and it's a place where you're not going to be judged for what you say anyway,


Speaker 21  22:14  

you're just going to be heard. Is such a phenomenon that really can't be found anywhere else on this planet, and that's the potential, I think, for peace building to remember that we need to apply these lessons outside the circle to really Make the impact. So thank you very much to everyone who worked hard to put this together. Much gratitude to Edwin for his brilliance and keeping this simple. I do think that's the beauty of it. Thank you.


Speaker 1  23:13  

So I went right as I went to go get coffee. I would say gratitude. I already think I said that, but I would say it again. So much gratitude for everyone who spoke, for everyone who made this happen, specifically to Jonathan for making everything look so seamless, like we all have this together so well, and Edwin for creating this space and this process with your team of experts, Bill and Lou and everyone else who's gotten to be involved in this. I use it every single day in my personal coaching practice, I train it at all of my COVID events, because I think that it's that it's that simple thing, that it just allows us to human better, and as a neuro, spicy person myself more human, more better, more better my life. Thanks so much.


Speaker 2  23:58  

Thank you. Kara, so I'll say something, and then I'll turn it over to Edwin, and then you can share how it was for you. Is that sound? Okay? Edwin, so, yeah. So we had a beautiful empathy circle, and thank you for coming. We had three people who were brand new to an empathy circle, and and Jeanette was in my circle. And it was quite moving. Thank you. And as for the future, I I feel, I believe, that we haven't even begun to tap the potential of this community in this practice for problem solving and for conflict resolution. So that's kind of so with that kind of view to the future. Thank you all very much for this opportunity, and I'm very honored and very happy to be with everyone. Thank you. Go ahead. Edwin, okay,


Edwin Rutsch  24:49  

thanks. Okay. I want to thank the speakers and the volunteers and the participants for taking part and working to. To build this empathic culture, where we've talked about the empathy circle, but it's only a gateway practice to a larger vision of transforming society to be more mutually empathic, and that just means for people to listen to each other, work out their differences, collaborate together to just to create more well being and flourishing for humanity. And for me, it seems that empathy is sort of the core, the gateway value for that and that mutuality too, and I love in our circle, the shared working together on our project. You know, having that community, but working towards something in a constructive and innovative and creative and connecting direction. So with that, we're kind of coming to the close, and I'm going to post into the chat. Maybe we already posted it. Let me see.

2024-11-02: Empathy Summit: Empathy Circle 2 by Ruth

The Empathy Summit session on November 2nd, 2024, focused on exploring empathy circles. Participants shared their experiences and perspectives on empathy.


Outline

Empathy Circle Introduction and Initial Setup


Empathy Circle Guidelines and First Speaker


Craig's Experience with Empathy Circles


Daniel Hirtz on Empathy and Meditation


Maria's Reflections on Empathy and Cultural Hierarchies


Mohammed Andrew on Empathy and Understanding Feelings


Daniel Hirtz on Empathy and Oneness


Maria's Reflections on Empathy and Active Listening


Mohammed Andrew on Empathy and Cultural Respect


Daniel Hirtz on Empathy and Music


Craig's Reflections on Empathy and Connection


Final Reflections and Closing Remarks