WATCH: TED Partners With United Nations To Celebrate 'Charter For Compassion' (VIDEO, LIVE BLOG)
TEDPrize@UN recognized the one-year anniversary of Karen Armstrong's Charter for Compassion Thursday, Nov. 18 with a celebratory TED talk at the United Nations Headquarters in New York.
This is the first time that a TED event took place at the United Nations. Armstrong, Rev. Dr. Joan Brown Campbell, Dr. Fred Luskin, Krista Tippett, Chade-Meng Tan and Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf discussed the intersections between faith, society, politics and where compassion can play a role. TEDPrize@UN also featured a performance from U.N. Goodwill Ambassador Salman Ahmad.
Armstrong won the 2008 TEDPrize granting her wish to create the Charter for Compassion, a document that urges all people and all religions of the world to embrace the value of compassion. She unveiled the Charter on Nov. 12, 2009.
TEDPrize@UN took place from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. EST. We blogged live throughout the event. Did you miss it?
WATCH:
READ HIGHLIGHTS:
12:58 PM ET Chris Anderson Concludes
Compassion: The Best Idea. Ever.
12:54 PM ET Salman Ahmad Wraps Up The TEDPrize@UN Event
The Pakistani-born musician first broadcasts a music video for us called "Open Your Eyes" that he recorded with Peter Gabriel.
Music opens doors inside the heart.
He invites his wife and son to come up on stage and perform with him.
He wants us to sing with him syllables:
"Um tum tanananana"
Open Your Eyes
Open Your Heart
Room is clapping together - perhaps the choir Armstrong referenced is now singing.
12:46 PM ET The Power Of ONE Person To Change The World
Great sages did not only exist in the long past, we have Gandhi, Dalai Lama, Martin Luther King, Jr., Nelson Mandela, Einstein, etc. in our recent history. They didn't live during a time of complete peace -- they lived in the middle of the destruction and pain that exists in the world. She says this to illustrate the power of ONE person to make a huge change in the world. We can all become a sage and the task is now.
In response to critics who tell her she's preaching to the choir she says:"I am not at all unhappy preaching to the choir, because the choir isn't singing" - Karen Armstrong
Time to sing.
12:39 PM ET Karen Armstrong, The Woman Of Honor Today, Takes The Stage
Today is the one year anniversary from the launch of her Charter for Compassion. She urges us to make space and make place for the other. We are all connected, whether we like it or not. What happens in Afghanistan today, is likely to have repercussions in New York or London tomorrow.
The task of our generation is to build a global community in which all humans can live together with honor and respect. We need a global democracy -- one where everyone has a voice. Treating all people/nations it's not just the nice thing to do, but it's essential for the preservation of our humanity. She announces her new book 12 Steps To A Compassionate Life -- reference to AA is intentional because we're addicted to our egotism and self-righteousness.
12:31 PM ET Love Is A Component Of Compassion
The Imam's grandfather said the following to his father: Can you imagine someone loving someone else more than they love him/herself? He was illustrating that parents love their children more than themselves.
12:25 PM ET Imam Feisal Rauf Speaks About God, "The Compassionate"
Recognize the image of God in each one of us, he urges. There are two purposes in Abrahamic faiths: Love the Lord thy God and love they neighbor as thyself. In Sufi tradition -- every human being cannot love God without loving the image of God in each and every one of us.
Through learning the act of dying we learn about living. God defines itself as "The Compassionate." So we exist because of "The Compassionate" and to "The Compassionate" is where we are returning.
12:19 PM ET Imam Feisal Abdul Rauf on Compassion
"Call him God, call him The Compassionate" -- concepts exist as verbs and God is the ultimate compassionate being. According to the Qur'an, the purpose of The Prophet Muhammad is to be a source of compassion in the world. The Prophet says, "The greatest jihad is the jihad against the ego in ourselves -- it is in that struggle that the door opens up for us into compassion."
12:06 PM ET Chade-Meng Tan on Compassion at Google
He says it always starts from the bottom up. Social Responsibility Team at Google was started by just a few people and the company said "yes." Google is a compassionate and highly competent company because Googlers find compassion to be fun. But there are business benefits as well -- compassion creates a highly affective staff.
"Google is the place where the inmates run the asylum" -- Meng says, referring to the culture of autonomy at Google that is helpful for performance.
In leadership, the ideal is to be Humble and Ambitious - they make the best business leaders.
Affective (I feel for you) ---> Humble
Cognitive (I understand you) ---> Humble
Motivational (I want to help you) ---> Ambition
11:57 AM ET Chade Meng-Tan on Compassion
Says Matthieu Ricard is happiest man alive whose brain was ever measured - at that time he was measured he was thinking about compassion: The happiest state. Compassion is fun! But what if it was also profitable?! Good for business.. Cool idea.
11:52 AM ET Krista's Final Definition of Compassion
"It's a spiritual technology", she says.
11:47 AM ET Krista Tippett on the Power of Stories
We need stories to grow and change, she says. There's a story behind the moral longing of Judaism to repair the world - Dr. Rachel Naomi Remen told Krista. The story insists that each and every one of us, has what's needed to repair the part of the world that we can see and touch.
11:43 AM ET Krista Tippett Talks About A Linguistic Experiment
Krista talks about the word, compassion. She says it's kind and curious without assumptions. Compassion can be an act of presence, generosity, hospitality, just showing up. Compassion is visible - it changes the way we think about what is possible. Shows us a picture of a paraplegic yoga teacher, Matthew, doing a split!
11:37 AM ET Chris Anderson and Our Compassion Experiment
Chris Anderson has us look at the person next to us in the eyes for a little longer than we normally do - amazing how strange it can feel to do that!
11:33 AM ET Dr. Fred Luskin Talks About Having Compassion For Our Vulnerability
The first piece of compassion is to broaden the hurt, Dr. Luskin says. Loss can be in the form of safety, pain, innocence... He urges us to quiet down our nervous system activity and open our hearts back up. There is no way to fully protect ourselves from pain. So when you say - "I won't let that hurt happen to me again," he urges people to know that it can -- and it's OK without condoning the act that hurts us. He believes in forgiveness.
11:26 AM ET Dr. Fred Luskin:
"People in general suffer from a Grinch heart. Most of our hearts are two sizes too small."
11:25 AM ET Dr. Fred Luskin:
"When your heart closes down, it becomes very hard to either offer compassion or to receive it."
11:22 AM ET Dr. Fred Luskin Takes The Stage
"I deal directly with people who are suffering. ... One of the things I have seen is how difficult it is for people to let their wounds go, and they hold it."
11:21 AM ET The Rev. Dr. Joan Brown Campbell:
"This IS a compassionate world!"
11:11 AM ET Hello, everyone!
We're live!
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The Huffington Post First Posted: 11/18/2010 7:28 am Updated: 11/17/2011 8:02 am