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I'll send you some clown shoes
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I'll send you some clown shoes

Wobbling along to embodied empathy

Jim Dalling
Feb 24, 2021
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I’ll send you some clown shoes.

They’re big ones to fill.

Best part?

You never can.

Just walk in your own odd damn way.


One Derful Thing

Do whatever you can to observe someone else moving. Walking. Eating. Brushing their teeth. Anything. That stuff.

Live alone?

Put on a hazmat suit. Go to the perimeter of a supermarket.

See if you can smell the fear

Or at least

Recognize it.

In a gait.

Notice where their weight is on their feet

Notice how their posture is different.

How do they hold their head?

Where are their shoulders?

What’s going on with their pelvis?

Their feet?

What are their knees like?

Then?

you start to

Put them on

Just a little bit at a time

A bit more slouched?

Toes pointing in?

Chest held up stiffly. A shield. Breastplate of bronze.

Feel just a bit what it’s like to be some else

Feel just a bit what it’s like to walk in someone else’s shoes

Not totally.

No one can.

But empathy?

That’s an act of imagination.

And.

If you’re really clever?

Of imitation as well.

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