No excuses

How will you show empathy today?

Empathy is a skill that can be learned. It’s not an innate talent or a stroke of luck. It’s developed over hundreds of everyday opportunities — interactions with strangers, conversations with friends and family, meetings at work, and more.

We can stay curious.
We can assume good intent.
We can be gutsy.
We can withhold judgment and ask more questions.
We can remember there’s almost always more than two sides to a story.
We can own (all of) our emotions.
We can sit on the same side of the table.
We can ask for help.
We can show up and be present.
We can listen.
We can acknowledge pain.
We can invest in emotional resilience.
We can be real about the hard parts.
We can try again when we fail.

If we choose, empathy can become a daily practice — a way of life. We might not get it right the first (or fifth) time. It’s hard and takes practice, but we have no excuse for not trying.

How will you show empathy today?