James O'Brien dedicated an episode to my new album. Read it here: https://jamesobriennyc.substack.com/p/ayd-weekly-utopia-revisited

Or follow All Your Days on your favorite podcast player.

Why? Well, I'm going to have a little human with me and I want to limit access to my paying supporters.

Also, I want to test out Crowdcast to do it and see if it might be the way to go from here. If you are not a patron yet, you can join for as little as $1/month.

Sign in at Patreon and the show will start at 5pm sharp. I'm curious to see how it goes! Might be a step up.

See you there and send me requests on twitter @jiminfantino

- Jim

THURSDAY, April 1, 2021

5:00 PM to 6:15 PM

Solo In Isolation #31

YouTube Live

View it here: youtu.be/kV18Y29eO30

I have changed the date this week because of the Easter weekend. I will be away in a place where I don't feel secure about the internet connection this Saturday - so IT'S APRIL 1 instead. I'm keeping the time the same. Make a note!

Saturday, January 9, 2021

5:00 PM to 6:15 PM

Solo In Isolation #25

YouTube Live

website: youtu.be/ccpnpMEhCJw

Come join in the fun. If you want to find the past concerts, please become a patron of my work at Patreon. I'm adding content all the time and have unearthed some recordings that are not available anywhere else. Membership starts at $1/mo.

See you then - tweet me requests @jiminfantino! They haven't taken down my account yet!

Hi, Jim. Could you elaborate further on the "inverted empathy"? I came across your model before by chance, and in the process of looking up when empaths clash, I came across this again and believe this occurred. And could possibly be occurring in another respect? Not sure. Specifically, if you have anything on healing from an act of inverted empathy it is appreciated. Or something that you might find helpful.Thank you so much for any insights or thoughts you might have.

E.

Hi E.,

I’ve been pondering your email for a while and I will try to respond with something approaching intelligent.

My starting place for that article is my experience with meditation and an understanding that empathy is an essential part of human nature. There are many views on this. In my study of Buddhism, I find it called Buddha Nature which they believe everyone has. From an evolutionary perspective, it is caused by the fact that humans have survived not because of our individual physical power, but the power we have when we work together in social groups. Empathy is required for survival and empathy is part of the mind. It also occurs in animals in different and similar ways.

Empathy becomes inverted and used to justify anger and aggression when a person is afraid. Empathy is fundamentally frightening. It makes us aware of the existence and experience of other people. Our world is full of humans now so our awareness of the existence of the experience of others is heightened. People can torment themselves with models (see my post on models) of people they create that mimic the fear of the person modeling them.

A person might think, “just like me, that other person wants to be safe.” For one who might have caused harm, or been part of a group of people who have caused harm to another person or group it turns to fear because of the empathic modeling of the other and recognizing that they might be angry or fearful of the opposing group. Empathy and fear becomes hatred and anger in what I’ve labeled “inverted empathy.”

How can we heal this? I haven’t thought much about that. Perhaps I should have. I would recommend using pure empathy and listening to counteract the empathy that becomes fear. I think it’s also important to recognize that when we react to a person, we generally react to the model of the person we’ve created, not the real person we see and hear in front of us. Our models are flawed. The cure for that is listening without modeling which takes practice. The root of that practice is mindfulness.

When we quiet the mind, we start to become aware of the modeling process and recognize the flaws that are inherent in that process. Modeling other people is empathic and built on an ability to know and belong but it is always just a model, not reality. That sort of empathy is not pure and referred often in American Buddhism as ‘Idiot Compassion.’ Pure empathy and compassion are based on emptiness which is the recognition that the models we create to navigate our way through the world are like vapor. They arise and dissipate. They have no inherent existence. They fail, and we rebuild them based on our experience. They can never be real and yet, they are all we have.

When I meet someone and listen to them while being aware of the empty nature of my models, I can start to really hear that other person. Their models of reality, their models of me, and the churning nature of existence enters my awareness and my fear lessens. As my fear dissolves, my anger and hatred has no footing. My models of that person and groups of people become less solid and real. This, in my opinion, is the way to heal inverted empathy.

I hope that helps.

... to be continued, I hope.

SHOW LINK - join in at 5pm EDT Saturday, April 25. (I do a sound test 5 mins early) https://youtu.be/I8D6al5TnyI

I will be doing my 6th Solo In Isolation show from my sofa live on YouTube this Saturday at 5pm EDT. You can send requests to @jiminfantino on twitter or to me on facebook https://facebook.com/jinfantino/

Because this is a live show, I will archive each show after 1 week of playing them.

Subscribe to the Jim's Big Ego YouTube Channel to get more information: https://www.youtube.com/user/jimsbigego

25% of all tips from Ko-fi and Venmo will go to the Passim Emergency Artist Relief Fund https://passim.org/pearfund/

The shows run about an hour and I plan to have an after-party again on Zoom. I will post the link at the end of the show.

I also want to mention that I'm a co-ordinator for Jim Rosen's online Zoom based meditation group. We meet Tuesdays and Thursdays at 10am EDT. Jim Rosen has been my meditation instructor for over a decade. He is very down to earth and personable. I help out by managing the member flow in the group. This is a great way to help you with the stress of these uncertain times. Go to https://jimrosen.com/meditate to sign up.

Stay healthy, Stay well, stay sane.

- Jim