Empathy is traveling. Traveling from yourself to expand and meet another in their place and context. Travel I did this past week along with nine others to walk alongside Craig Mod, Kevin Kelly, and walkers for a Walk and Talk. With an unbending pace, we walked for seven days in the hills of northern Thailand, across local farms, across elephant camps, across rivers, across bridges and under waterfalls, and into the reality of cultures and one another’s lives. 100.3 kilometers on a path.
This path was a Walk and Talk, a gathering of about 10 people, beginning at the highest point at Doi Inthanon, then descending many conversations and adventures later into the old city of Chiang Mai. It was a path, chartered by our thoughtful local walking partner and seven days unfolded long and full with conversations in sets of two and three, as we traversed together each day. As we traveled, we journeyed in layers — those in the evenings, Jeffersonian Dinner-style, and those in groups by day, winding our ways into each other’s ideas and context. With this formula, empathy quickly emerged.
More than one hundred years before, back in 1909, at least one significant thing happened: someone named Edward Titchener coined the word “empathy.” I learned this from Rebecca Solnit who notes the root word “path” is from the Greek for “passion or suffering.” And “[i]t’s a coincidence that empathy is built from a homonym for the Old English path, as in a trail. Or a dark labyrinth named Path. Empathy is a journey you travel, if you pay attention, if you care, if you desire to do so.”
On Day Four of our own journey, our empathy and attention turned toward another walking companion, a small dog who joined our group. This spirited and besmitten dog joined us at an elephant camp where we had lodged the night before. Gaining the name “TD” for “Thai Dog,” he trailed us over fields and hills, roads and villages, swimming his way down a river to stay with us at one stage.
The river may have been the end of our time with TD, but he traversed tangles of trees, rocks, and swam to hop a bamboo raft and float with us, showing off his rather unflappable side when we got to land. He followed us another 50+ kilometers into the old city of Chiang Mai.
Through the generosity of a series of strangers in the old city, we found TD vet care and a permanent home where he could live north of the city among fields, a (female) dog friend, other animal companions. The particular tenacity of his loyalty was shared and passed on to a caretaker through the kindness of Thai strangers who helped us get him there. Empathy traveled.
Empathy means that you travel out of yourself a little or expand. Ten days later, they are mingled and entwined — the stories, the remarkable people, the dinner topics, the walking, TD. They are mingled and entwined in a path forward from the hills to Chiang Mai into today and a series of tomorrows. One where everyone gets to return to a home full and expanded.
Coda: So grateful to Kevin and Craig and Chris. Could have walked another 100.3 kilometers — with some rest in between. Thanks to Silvia for manifesting, dog care, and high-speed tuktuk rides.