Workshop: EMPATHY

Workshops for Community Leaders
EMPATHY EXERCISE


PURPOSE: To enlarge understanding of the problems of others and to give help in solving them To experience what one' s own problem looks like seen through the eyes of others. To experience the wisdom of the group aiding with each person's problem. To become aware of common threads in ail of our experiences.

TIME REQUIRED: 60 minutes

MATERIALS: Index or file cards and writing instrument for each participant.

PROCEDURE:
1. Divide the group into small groups of no more than 5 persons each. Provide each person with a file or index card and writing instrument.

2. Instruct the group that each person is to write on a card, " A problem I’m working on is ..." and finish the sentence. The cards are not to be signed. Once written, they are collected, shuffled, and redistributed at random within the small group. (If in the redistribution, a person receives back his own card, this is to be exchanged with someone else's so that each participant has a problem to deal with other than his own.)

3. Each person then reads to the group the card that he has received in the redistribution, reading it as if it were his own problem. He then explains it to the group, perhaps including ways he thinks of to solve it. Others then give their own experience with solving that sort o f problem, and their ownsuggestions.

4. Repeat this process until every problem raised in the small group has been dealt with by the group.

NOTE:Give plenty of time to this exercise. For many, it becomes the heart of the
workshop. It can be a turning point for a person who had been isolated and not
understood.
(Make any additional notes here of your experiences with this activity.)