The Empathy Project 2017

“Empathy isn’t just something that happens to us – a meteor shower of synapses firing across the brain – it’s also a choice we make: to pay attention, to extend ourselves. It’s made of exertion, that dowdier cousin of impulse. Sometimes we care for another because we know we should, or because it’s asked for, but this doesn’t make our caring hollow. This confession of effort chafes against the notion that empathy should always rise unbidden, that genuine means the same thing as unwilled, that intentionality is the enemy of love. But I believe in intention and I believe in work. I believe in waking up in the middle of the night and packing our bags and leaving our worst selves for our better ones.” — Leslie Jamison

Published Manuscript:

Gaining Perspectives on Patient and Family Disease Experiences by Storytelling

Summer 2017 at Stanford’s d. School
Funded by The Stanford School of Medicine

Taught By:

Henry Lee, MD
Seamus Harte, MFA Film & Video
Hamsika Chandrasekar, Stanford Medical Student
Jules Sherman, MFA Design