Slide 22

Compassion through Language

Compassionate communication is an approach to language involving talking, gestures and listening. It’s a language that discourages static generalizations, such as "all good" or "all bad." Rather, it offers an approach of understanding one's unmet needs that allows compassion for them. This can be applied to our work with our patients, families, colleagues and the media.

Using both the left brain (evidence-based decision making) and the right brain (compassion and empathy), one tries to separate the action (such as child abuse, which is bad) from the person (who may have had contributing unmet needs and vulnerabilities). In this way, compassion is not blocked.

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