Quietly Observant

Today I'm delighted because my Activate Empathy, Mobilize Kindness guest post went live on the Free Spirit Publishing blog this morning. It has been so much fun, to be assigned a topic, let it marinate while prewriting it in my head, then write and rewrite on paper. I'm really pleased with how it turned out.

I'm happy with how my homework assignment turned out, too.

Click image to read about the Therapeutic Effects of Coloring

Our AP put these in our boxes right before we left for the holidays, with a challenge to color it for a visual display she wants to make. In a fun coincidence, it just so happens that my sister got three types of coloring mediums, which she willingly shared. We had fun side-by-side, pretending to be artists.

We've also been doing some reading; 

I started Making Rounds With Oscar this morning.

 

It's an account about an ordinary feline with extraordinary feelings,

 a cat who can sense when a person is in his/her last earthly day, 

a quiet observer who makes his way to the dying person's side.

We also saw a movie, which loosely connects to Oscar's tale.

I laughed and I cried through The Intern, 

featuring Robert DeNiro and Anne Hathaway.

(Disclaimer: There are a few distasteful words and scenes.)

It's about a fashion start-up that decides to hire senior interns (DeNiro) and the brain-child behind the dot com (Hathaway) who wants nothing to do with the one who gets assigned to her. In fact, before she realizes how much she can learn from him, she demands he be transferred to another department. 

The reason? He's just "too observant." 

A quiet observer, like the comfort cat.

So much food for thought coupled with examples of elevated empathy in both of these. When we're able to get quiet, to silently observe from outside of ourselves, then we can see what others need and experience their emotions.

When is the last time you got to be a quiet observer?

What did you notice?

What did you learn?

How did you grow?