
What is Empathy, Really?
Empathy is not a state to acheive. Empathy is a continuous unfolding process of listening and our ability to connecting with ourselves is the foundational ingredient to being able empathize with others.

Visioning Exercise: A glimpse of a possible future
A vision of the future of a company that integrated the Mapping Ourselves program into its culture.

Santa Barbara Continues to Innovate to Leverage Atlas CareMaps
Key Takeaways Can the impact of in-person Atlas CareMap Workshops be replicated through online media, making them more widely available? Can successful adoption of Atlas CareMaps be accelerated through cross-organizational sharing of experiences? How are social services and systems impacted when the Atlas CareMap is incorporated into existing processes that touch family caregivers? This is…

Seeing Value, Busy Professionals Voluntarily Add to Their Efforts
Key Takeaways Social workers are finding so much value in using Atlas CareMaps with their clients, that they are voluntarily adding this tool to their already overloaded schedules. Excitement and interest about Atlas CareMaps has spread organically within the professional health and social services community in Santa Barbara County. Grant making organizations, moved by the…

A Grassroots Group Finds Its Voice
Key Takeaways Someone in the community needs to lead. The enthusiasm and personal outreach of two of the promotoras, Josefa Rios and Maribel Landeros, was critical at the start to get a large group of other promotoras to devote several hours of precious time to attend an esoteric-sounding workshop. The Atlas CareMap appears to have…

Uncovering Community Wisdom Amongst Santa Barbara Family Caregivers
Key Takeaways Atlas CareMaps serve as a catalyst to spark social, peer-to-peer conversations about family caregiving, resulting in uncovering community wisdom and strengthening community bonds. Once people begin to map their care relationships, they start to see them everywhere. The response to the experimental methods explored in Mapping Yourself shows that there is the potential…

Sharing Knowledge & Building Collaborations: Dementia in the Alps
Fifty extraordinary and passionate people from around the world met for five days in Salzburg, Austria to discuss “Changing Minds: Innovations in Dementia Care and Dementia-Friendly Communities”. The event was organized by the Salzburg Global Seminar, and held at the fabulous Schloss Leopoldskron. I was delighted to be invited to join a group of world…

Drawing With Data In Mind
The digital Atlas CareMap, still in development, is an exciting project aimed at increasing the accessibility and functionality of the traditional CareMap and to collect first-of-its-kind data about our care ecosystems. To build the digital CareMap, Atlas of Caregiving has partnered with Accurat, a data-driven design and research firm. Accurat specializes in building visual narratives…

Mapping Yourself in Santa Barbara
Each month, CEO Rajiv Mehta, Atlas Advisor Dawn Nafus, and Susan Williams head to Santa Barbara to meet with a handful of people who have committed to the “Mapping Yourself” series of workshops. The workshops are an opportunity for participants to learn deeply about themselves and their situation so that they can better identify new…