85. How we can write our way to Empathy. An Elephant Gathering.

09/07/20 • 38 min

Elephant Journal: Walk the Talk Show with Waylon Lewis

Empathy transforms stress and difficulty and even suffering into joy, generosity, and love. ⁠ Empathy is the world's most transformative emotion—and we can write our way to it. 💔❤️ Write your Heart Out with us this fall. Our full, live, original, classic Elephant Academy is back and is $200 off through September 13th with code SHAREYOURHEART: elephantjournal.com/academy Join our Maitri: How to Fall in Love with your Sweet Self at 50% off during pre-registration (for not much longer!): elephantjournal.com/maitri For the articles referenced in this video & Waylon's "Lately, I've struggled with...", head to the article "Lately, I've struggled with..." on elephantjournal.com: https://elejrnl.com?p=2594299 ~ Writing isn’t for writers—it’s for anyone with a beating heart, anyone who cares about our world, anyone who truly cares about their sweet self. That's maitri—making friends with yourself, and that’s a path we can all engage on.⁠ Writing through our neurosis, writing our story, finding our voice, writing to catharsis...to a place where what has held us back transforms and becomes like a flower opening to the world...that's our heart, opening, genuinely inspiring others to do the same thing.⁠ ⁠ Take a leap into loving yourself and re-inspiring your purpose: elephantjournal.com/academy ($200 off for the early brave foolish joiners among you with code SHAREYOURHEART). ⁠ For you. We don't know if, or when, we'll do it again.⁠ ⁠ Join Mentors, peers, Elephant Editors, and Waylon for 6 weeks this Fall. We're coming together to write together, and learn how to fall in love with ourselves and our lives through our craft. ⁠

Previous Episode

Waylon w/ Sharon Salzberg on Real Change: Mindfulness to Heal Ourselves & the World.

Just had the honor to talk (listen) with Sharon Salzberg, a wonderful teacher of Loving-Kindness, or Maitri, or Metta—how to make friends with ourselves, so that we might enjoy empathy and be of real benefit to this world, instead of drowning in self-hate, pre-judgement of others, and war with our world.

📕 Get her new book, Real Change: Mindfulness to Heal Ourselves and the World: https://www.sharonsalzberg.com/realchange/

I can’t wait to read it—she’s such a darned good writer and sweet and powerful human. ~ Waylon Lewis

💔♥️🙏

♥️ If you’re inspired to go deeper, do our Maitri: How to Fall in Love with your Sweet Self course featuring an exclusive video with Sharon Salzberg on how to actually practice Maitri: https://elephantjournal.com/maitri 👈🐘 (Half off now for preregistration.)

Additional articles mentioned: • The Most Important Article on Elephant, Ever: Maitri: https://www.elephantjournal.com/2012/04/maitri/ • A Positivity Manifesto: https://www.elephantjournal.com/2012/10/a-positivity-manifesto/ • The Buddhist Rule about Worrying: https://www.elephantjournal.com/2009/08/buddhist-rule-re-worrying

For the full article with even more Sharon Salzberg goodness, head to: https://www.elephantjournal.com/2020/07/waylon-with-sharon-salzberg-real-change-mindfulness-to-heal-ourselves-the-world-video/

If you love Elephant and want to support us and enable us to keep doing videos like these, subscribe: https://www.elephantjournal.com/subscribe/

Next Episode

Julia Cameron: my favorite guest on Walk the Talk Show in a long time.

Yesterday, I got to talk (and listen) with one of the world’s greatest writing teachers. Writing, at its heart, is not about writing—but about listening, about finding our voice, about being of benefit—a spiritual path of catharsis, of turning confusion to wisdom. I fell in love. She listed three key simple, repetitive practices to this path of listening. Read an excerpt of her new book: https://www.elephantjournal.com/2021/02/julia-cameron-my-favorite-guest-on-walk-the-talk-show-in-a-long-time/ Get her new book: https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250768582 ~

Write your Heart out with Elephant Academy: This writing course isn't (just) for writers. It's for anyone who ever writes—on Instagram, in work emails, in a private journal or on a public forum. This writing course is for you—to get vulnerable, get brave, get grounded, get open. Let's do it together this Spring: https://elephant-academy.teachable.com/