David Cross Quotes

I don't like controversies. I try to understand where a person comes from and where he is.

Hear the other side.

Finding common ground means reaching out with respect and aloha - despite the issues that divide us, despite the hurt, despite the fear - and recognize what unites us as human beings.

We need to understand the other side to impact the other side. We become much more effective as humans and leaders when we engage in hearty conversations with those who are different from us, not necessarily to change our opinions, but to build the empathy muscle.

I think I've always had that orientation to try to understand the humanity behind people with whom I disagree.

We can never judge a soul above the high water mark of our own.

People are starting to understand the other side's perspective and that's where empathy can sort of begin - once you quit judging other people but just understand where they're coming from.

I don't just want to talk to the choir. I want to sit down and be respectful of the people who are most unlike me, to get them to hear me and think. It doesn't mean you're going to change them right there, but just so they can hear you and what you're saying.

Remember that other people may be totally wrong. But they don't think so. Don't condemn them. Any fool can do that. Try to understand them. Only wise, tolerant, exceptional people even try to do that.

I learned to have the patience to listen when people put forward their views, even if I think those views are wrong. You can't reach a just decision in a dispute unless you listen to both sides.

Empathy is the most mysterious transaction that the human soul can have, and it's accessible to all of us, but we have to give ourselves the opportunity to identify, to plunge ourselves in a story where we see the world from the bottom up or through another's eyes or heart.

Know how to listen, and you will profit even from those who talk badly.

Could a greater miracle take place than for us to look through each other's eyes for an instant?

That most dangerous of opponents: the one who took pains to comprehend the position of his adversary.

It's a very important thing to learn to talk to people you disagree with.

The man who can put himself in the place of other men, who can understand the workings of their minds, need never worry about what the future has in store for him.

I think one of the biggest political failures, and the biggest social failures, over the past few years has been the failure of empathy; not being able to look at the other person down the street.

If I hadn't read all of Jane Austen and DH Lawrence, Tolstoy and Proust, as well as the more fun stuff, I wouldn't know how to break bad news, how to sympathise, how to be a friend or a lover, because I wouldn't have any idea what was going on in anybody else's mind.

I'm usually pretty good about meeting people. I try to remember they are human, too!

For me, literature is a way of enlarging myself by learning about people who are not like me.

My own experience is use the tools that are out there. Use the digital world. But never lose sight of the need to reach out and talk to other people who don't share your view. Listen to them and see if you can find a way to compromise.

I think there is a tendency for people to get rigid and caught up in their beliefs of what is right and wrong, and they lose sight of humanity. Being human has to come first before right or wrong.

It's got to do with putting yourself in other people's shoes and seeing how far you can come to truly understand them. I like the empathy that comes from acting.

Being listened to and being heard is an experience that doesn't happen terribly often. To listen compassionately or nonjudgmentally to another person - not to get too heavy about it - but I once heard somebody say that was a form of real prayer.

Real answers need to be found in dialogue and interaction and, yes, our shared human condition. This means being open to one another instead of simply fighting to maintain a prescribed position.