How Empathy Can Bridge the Gap Between US and North Korea

The most important question you can ever ask is if the Universe is a friendly place – Albert Einstein

The world knows it needs to be more empathic, but even though communication experts have made a convincing case for it, they have not made a compelling enough one to cause people to make the effort to learn the skills to do it.

What follows is an empirical (non-evidence based) approach to making a compelling and hopefully convincing case that even left brain and analytical people will have difficulty refuting and rejecting.

To begin here is a Glossary of terms:

Glossary:

• Foreign Policy - the policies of a government regarding relations with other countries that are different
• Mirror Neurons – specialized nerve cells in the brain associated with imitation, learning and empathy and when dysfunctional, associated with autism
• Mirror Neuron Gap – the differential between how one perceives they are being treated by others relative to how one perceives they are treating others
• Cortisol - a hormone involved in the regulation of metabolism in the body’s cells and helps us regulate stress within the body
• Dopamine – a neurotransmitter that plays a major role in reward-motivated behavior
• Oxytocin - otherwise known as the “love hormone,” is released by the pituitary gland and is responsible for human behaviors associated with relationships and bonding and the emotional feeling of closeness
• Adrenaline - a substance that is released in the body of a person who is feeling a strong emotion (such as excitement, fear, or anger) and that causes the heart to beat faster and gives the person more energy and feel more powerful
• Testosterone – a steroid hormone produced in the testes that manifests itself in various intensities and forms from; thoughts, anger, verbal aggressiveness, competition, dominance behavior, to physical violence that plays a significant role in the arousal of these behavioral manifestations in the brain centers involved in aggression and on the development of the muscular system that enables their realization
• Amygdala – a structure in the limbic (emotional) system of the brain involved in fear and aggression that serves as the “emotional sentinel”
• Amygdala Hijack - an immediate, overwhelming emotional response triggered in a neurologic structure call the amygdala with a later realization that the response was inappropriately strong given the trigger
• Empathy – the exercising of putting oneself in another person’s POV and looking, hearing and when possible feeling the world from their perspective
• Antipathy – the feeling of animosity, anger, aversion towards another person or entity generally caused by a projection of one’s own hostile feelings upon the other and then reacting hostilely towards them because of it and feeling justified in doing so

Foreign Policy is the set of policies of a government regarding relations with other countries and to adapt from Einstein’s quote will often differ widely depending on whether you view other countries as friendly or hostile.

Depending on which view you hold, your brain’s reaction and your mind’s response will vary widely... which brings us to the subject of neuroscience and the resultant neuropsychology that underpins behavior.

Seeing is believing.

Of all our senses, vision is our initial way to sense something at the greatest distance (even when we watch or read the media).

Mirror Neurons and the Mirror Neuron Gap

Mirror Neurons, first discovered in Macaque monkeys in the 1980’s, were originally called, “Monkey See, Monkey Do Neurons,” because they were found to be associated with imitation behavior. They were later found in human beings and additionally found to be involved in learning and empathy and have also been referred to as “Empathy Neurons.” Furthermore, when defective or dysfunctional or absent, they have also been associated with Autism, because autistic individuals are unable to pick up on social cues and mirror them.

In my four decade+ career, first as a psychiatrist/psychotherapist, FBI and police hostage negotiation trainer, jury consultant (including working with the OJ Simpson criminal trial), sales/marketing speaker and consultant, and currently as a “CEO Whisperer,” I have empirically observed something I call the “Mirror Neuron Gap (MNG).” Explained extensively in my book, “Just Listen” Discover the Secret to Getting Through to Absolutely Anyone, the MNG widens depending on the more you feel people are treating you worse than you are treating them. Alternatively, the MNG narrows and even closes the more you feel people are treating you as well or even better than you are treating them.

To build upon Einstein’s quote, the more dangerous you perceive the universe, the wider the MNG; the safer and even beyond that, more empathic, compassionate and loving you perceive the universe, the narrower the MNG.

As a tangential but hopefully interesting aside, resolving the MNG is the reason male audiences cry at the ending of such movies as Field of Dreams, when the Kevin Costner character, Ray Kinsella, asks to have a catch with his father, John. That is because all through the movie, there is a widened MNG in the audience’s mind around why Ray is building a baseball field in Iowa. And when at the end, we male audience members discover that it’s to “Ease his pain” (of his father who never got to live out his dream), something the we identify with when we have issues with our fathers, and see Ray resolving his in a loving matter, we cry as we vicariously experience the relief to our ache to do the same. To make the point even greater of resolving the MNG and ache that a widened one causes, Ray is told by the character played by James Earl Jones, “If you build it, people will come.” And by the way, it’s literally true, because that field is one of the biggest tourist attractions in Iowa.

For younger audiences, a comparable dynamic with a similar tear jerker happy ending is the movie, Silver Linings Playbook. Throughout that movie Bradley Cooper’s and Jennifer Lawrence’s characters keep offending each other and having near misses that backfire regarding emotional intimacy and thereby widening the MNG. It is a scenario that many in the audience know all too well. At the end, following a dance event, Lawrence runs out into the streets only to be chased after by Cooper, who informs her that he loves and has always loved her, but had a crazy way of showing it. They hug, we cry, hold hands with our date more tightly and a romantic evening might follow.

In each of the above movie examples, crying coincides with the MNG being closed and the tension that is spontaneously replaced with tenderness and even rapture from that resolution. We cry because of the relief of vicariously going from conflicted and incomplete to feeling un-conflicted and complete.

Hormones and Neurotransmitters

When our cortisol goes up, we feel stressed... and when it goes way up, we feel distressed.

When our dopamine goes up, we feel pleasure... and way up, we feel ecstatic.

When our oxytocin goes up, we feel closer to an other... and way up, we feel bonded and loving towards them.

When we feel adrenaline, especially an adrenaline rush, we feel excited and powerful (although it can also be triggered in a “fight or flight” reaction to an imminent threat).

When we feel testosterone, we feel aggressive... and way up, we become hostile and belligerent.

The more we look out in the distance and sense the universe is unsafe and that we are viewing an enemy, the wider our MNG and more our cortisol, adrenaline and testosterone elevate.

The more we sense the universe is safe and even more, empathetic, sympathetic, compassionate and loving, the more our dopamine first (“this is pleasurable”) goes up.

Following that and when in a conversation we sense that we might want to be friends with the other person (which is referred to as, ”intersubjectivity”) our oxytocin goes up and the MNG lessens or even closes (i.e. “I think I really like this person”).

Amygdala and Amygdala Hijack

The Amygdala is a structure in the emotional, mammalian part of our brain. Also referred to as the brain’s “emotional sentinel” or “point guard,” it plays a pivotal role in whether we will take in a stimulus and be able to rationally consider it via our rational human brain or instead hijack the process when feeling threatened and instead bypass our logical thinking and react with a hard wired “fight or flight” (or freeze) – and also be likely to act irrationally.

Empathy and Antipathy

The reason empathy is fundamental to foreign affairs is that only through empathy and the other person truly feeling understood and even better “feeling felt” (also covered extensively in “Just Listen”) can you narrow the MNG, lower cortisol, raise dopamine and oxytocin and avert a rush of adrenaline and testosterone. More importantly, it is the best and perhaps only way to prevent an amygdala hijack and thereby enable the participants to engage in a rational and reasonable conversation.

Even more critical is the negative effect that the opposite of empathy can have. 

Antipathy is a hostile and belligerent feeling towards someone or something usually caused by projecting one’s own hostile feelings on them and then reacting to it with self-defensive and self-justified anger.

Applications to US – North Korea relations

The more either President Trump or Kim Jong Un act towards each other with antipathy, the wider the MNG, the greater the elevation of cortisol, the more likely a mutual Amygdala Hijack which results in further escalation, threats, antagonism and lessens the likelihood of a rational exchange.

Where Antipathy/Amygdala Hijack is Let Empathy/Cooperation Be

A guiding principle in Sigmund Freud’s Ego Psychology was: “Where Id is, let Ego be.” To Freud Id represented lust, anger, irrationality and impulsivity and ego represented – in contrast to its current meaning of arrogance - a reality check and responding to the facts rather than reacting irrationally and impulsively.

What to do now? An Olive Branch on Steroids

I have suggested the following in many of my presentations, most recently one to members of the Russian Federation, in a presentation on listening and empathy that was not merely well received, but hungered for. This was after one of the questions asked in the Q&A was what I thought of President Trump. At first, I was reluctant and hesitant, but by this time in my six hour, one day training I felt enough of a rapport to proceed.

My immediate response was that I didn’t like his style, and then suggested something he could do, but probably wouldn’t, that could be a game changer with Kim Jong Un.

It was built upon the incredible brimming with empathy and oxytocin and disarming power of an unsolicited apology. Whether you know it or not, there are tens of millions, if not hundreds of millions of people in the world that have never and will never receive an unsolicited apology. 

Here are the fantasied five steps:

1. President Trump communicates in some manner, perhaps through diplomats or the Secretary of State that he would like to speak directly with Kim Jong Un because he has an apology he wants to make (imagine the media spin on that!).
2. If Trump makes contact with Kim Jong Un, he would proceed to say, “Kim (and you can call me ‘Donald’ a la Reagan/Gorbachev). Would you agree that we see a number of things differently, most importantly, the increased proliferation of nuclear weapons?” Hopefully, Kim would respond albeit with great suspicion and hesitancy, “Yes.”
3. Next Trump would say, “In that case I want to apologize for making no attempt and putting no effort into understanding your thinking and how you arrived at the conclusion that you have no other choice in dealing with the world, specifically the United States, other than to build up your nuclear arsenal and capability.”
4. Then Trump would say, “And furthermore I want to apologize for not even caring about understanding your thinking and how you have come to the conclusions that you have. Instead I have been too busy pushing not only America’s agenda not based on any understanding of you, but escalating it with increasing threats which has made the situation even worse. For that, I am sorry and I have been wrong.
5. And finally, Trump would say, “Going forward and as a first step to correct this, I would like the opportunity to sit down with you and our interpreters and spend a full day or whatever it takes to fully understand your thinking, your conclusions and you so that we might forge a different and even mutually respectful relationship going forward vs. both of frightening the world. If you agree to that I promise that I will do something that is uncharacteristic for me. I will just listen and only ask questions to clarify what you are saying.”

And the response from the Russian audience?

They agree that would be a great step and might work and also that President Trump would never do it.

And I’m guessing the response from you, “Yeah, sure Mark... Dream on!”