Redefining Compassion

Sometimes when life-changing events unfold, I experience the unfolding of it as if I’m trapped in a bubble. I’m forced to bear witness and unable to do anything to stop the ripple effects of it. That’s how I felt listening to the news late in 2019 and early in 2020 as the reality of the COVID pandemic started unfolding, and that is how I felt on June 24^th when the Supreme Court overturned the landmark decision on women’s abortion rights, Roe vs. Wade.

I knew I was watching an event that would leave ripples in our society for many years to come, and my heart ached for the pain and suffering that the decision will still cause moving forward.

I’ve spent some time thinking about this and what I want to talk about today is not necessarily about Roe vs. Wade, but about a fundamental concept that underlies all of it – Roe vs. Wade and so much more – and that is the concept of compassion.

During a specific phase of my PhD research, I conducted interviews with participants. One of the questions I would ask interviewees was, “What does compassion mean to you?” I would then follow up that question with a second question, “How do you demonstrate compassion in your own life?”

The aim was to get a sense of what compassion really means to people and how they live compassion in their daily lives. The Oxford Dictionary defines compassion as, “sympathetic pity and concern for the sufferings or misfortunes of others.”

For me personally, that definition feels too narrow. It invites us to feel pity or concern for someone. It evokes within us this sense of feeling sorry for someone about what they are going through. And yet, pity falls short of what is needed. It simply levels compassion akin to sympathy, when my sense is that what is really needed is far more than just feeling sorry for someone.

People often draw a distinction between sympathy and empathy, where empathy is the ability to understand and share the feelings of others. Empathy takes sympathy to the next level because it invites you to bring your own humanness into the equation too. It invites you to imagine yourself in the other person’s shoes. What would it feel like for YOU to experience what the other person is experiencing right now?

And we humans have this incredible ability to imagine ourselves in the shoes of someone else. That is why we cringe when we see someone fall or get hurt. In that moment, we can absolutely imagine what the other person must be feeling. Our mirror neurons allow us to connect deeply with another human being and sense and share their pain.

After reading Megan Divine’s beautiful book on grief – It’s OK That You’re Not OK – I realised how easily we switch off our empathy and compassion when we feel uncomfortable, and how easy it is for people to fall into meaningless platitudes that really don’t meet the person where they are in their grief. If you’ve ever made yourself guilty of saying things like, “At least they are in a better place now”, or “This too shall pass”, or “At least you have another child”, or “I know how you feel, because my dog died last year…”, then you have made someone else feel a little more alone and a little less understood in this world. You have not honoured their grief. You have not met them where they are and allowed for their pain to be what it is.

And the truth is that you probably did it because of your own discomfort in the moment. When we feel ill-equipped to meet people’s emotions, we shut them down to soothe our own discomfort in the moment. We feel inadequate and ill at ease, and we try to smooth things over in an attempt to maker ourselves feel better.

And if you’ve ever been on the side of the griever, you know that these platitudes are meaningless and don’t lessen the pain, because let’s be honest, no amount of talking can ever bring back what and who has been lost. The truth is nothing is going to make it better and perhaps it’s not supposed to be made better right now. Perhaps the pain simply needs to be acknowledged.

True compassion is the ability to meet someone exactly where they are with their pain and to simply hold space for them to be with their pain. True compassion doesn’t always require action. Sometimes it simply requires presence. Real and true heart-felt presence. In times of grief, the friend who can sit quietly with us as we cry, is the friend that makes us feel most understood. The friend who simply says, “I’m sorry for your loss” and allows you to talk about it or not talk about it, is the one that supports you in your grief.

And I want to normalise this. We all say silly platitudes or dismiss people’s real feelings from time to time. We all have moments where we cannot connect with our deepest sense of empathy and compassion. However, we live in a world where it is imperative that we build the muscles of empathy and compassion, where we consciously work at being more present, more empathetic, more compassionate, more understanding of another’s reality.

Overturning Roe vs. Wade will have ripple effects that we cannot even fathom right now. What I do know is that it’s a symptom of a world that lacks compassion and understanding. It’s a symptom of a world where people are sometimes so stuck in their own worldview, that they allow no space to consider how another’s worldview might be very different AND yet just as valid.

I don’t have to agree with someone to have compassion for them. I simply must recognise that if the tables were turned, I would want them to have empathy for my situation and to meet me where I was at. And knowing that, is enough for me to stay open to being wrong about how someone else might see a situation that seems really clear-cut and simple to me.

When we shut others down, we also don’t get the whole story, so we make our decisions based on half truths. Allowing all voices to be heard, gives us a fuller picture of reality, and allows us to make decisions that support who we want to be in this world.

In my PhD interviews I would ask people what they do to demonstrate compassion in their lives, and I would hear all kinds of stories about acts of kindness towards loved ones and strangers. And even though those acts of kindness are wonderful, I also sense that perhaps we need to expand our definition of what it means to be kind.

The other day in a conversation with a client, we had the most interesting conversation about honesty. We tend to think that being honest about how we feel about something, or saying no to an invitation, would be perceived as rudeness, or would offend the other person, so we tend to simply nod, smile, acquiesce, agree, for the sake of maintaining the peace, when in reality, what would serve both us and the other person, is to tell the truth.

Telling the truth doesn’t mean that we are tactless and inconsiderate in our choice of words. It simply means that we share what’s in our hearts or on our minds in a way that says this is where I’m at right now. It doesn’t require explanations or defensiveness, merely honesty.

Piero Ferrrucci, in his beautiful book, The Power of Kindness, expands the definition of kindness by discussing in detail the different characteristics or components that constitute true kindness. And the first characteristic he discusses is honesty. Here is what he says about honesty:

“To act honestly – even at the risk of saying the unpleasant truth, or of saying no and causing distress to others – if done with intelligence and tact, is the kindest thing to do, because it respects our own integrity and acknowledges in others the capacity to be competent and mature.”

Just think how you would feel if someone tried to protect you by hiding the gravity of an illness, or not telling you about an unpleasant matter that was apparent to everyone else, or simply not letting you know that your makeup was a mess, or your fly was undone. All out of politeness, to protect you. The result is a feeling of being underestimated or even betrayed: “Why didn’t someone just tell me?” When the truth is revealed, we can make informed and compassionate decisions that serve us and those we love.

When the truth remains hidden, we run the risk of being inauthentic and breaking trust. Counter to what you might believe about honesty and boundaries, people don’t get offended by it. They appreciate it and they respect you more.

And, hiding the truth from someone to spare their feelings or to not offend, also means that we don’t respect the other person as someone who is naturally resourceful, creative, and whole – or as Piero Ferrucci puts it, “competent and mature”. It means we underestimate the other person’s capacity to receive feedback, to deal with reality, to make decisions that support who they want to be in the world, or we perpetuate cycles of neediness and dependency that doesn’t serve either party.

So, dear reader, if you are someone who has a hard time telling the truth or sharing what you need, saying no, or putting boundaries in place, slow that down and ask yourself what assumptions you are making about the other person. What are you telling yourself about the other person’s capacity to accept boundaries, or to use the information you share to inform their next decision? Does your thinking about the other person serve you or them? Does it strengthen your relationship with each other?

As a recovering people pleaser myself, I used to live in fear of how others would respond if I were to say no or express how I truly felt about something. By working on it with my coach, I have gradually built the skill to share my boundaries and my truth in ways that are intelligent, tactful, kind, and considerate, and I’ve been blown away by how much people have appreciated the clarity and honesty. It really is the kinder choice.

Additionally, it has deepened some of my relationships because I’m no longer taking responsibility for another person when they have not asked that of me. To me, that is the ultimate demonstration of trust and respect – i.e., to hold true that the other person can make decisions about their own life, and that they know better what they need than I do.

Another characteristic that Piero Ferrucci discusses in his book, is respect. And he starts off the chapter with this powerful sentence: “We all know how it feels to be seen for less than what we are.” He elaborates: “We feel that we are treated as if we were another person – a poorer, unrecognisable version of ourselves. Our qualities are not perceived, and we are prescribed flaws that are not ours. It’s an unpleasant experience that fills us with insecurity and resentment…”

Ferrucci explains that having respect for someone requires slowing down to look, to regard, to consider, to appreciate. We are never neutral in how we perceive the world because we perceive the world through our own lens, but when we bring our attention to something, we bring respect to it. Lack of attention takes away respect and regard.

It’s the ultimate audacity to imagine that we know what’s best for another person. For me to assume that I know what’s best for someone else, it would mean that I’m also making a couple of other assumptions, such as that the other person thinks just like me, i.e., that they share my worldview, that the other person values all the things I value, and that the other person is not capable of making their own choices in life; that they need someone else to step in and take care of them, because they are simply not naturally resourceful, creative, and whole.

Now, I know you might say that you have relationships were someone IS dependent on you, and they really don’t believe they are naturally resourceful, creative, and whole, and they truly do make bad decisions when left to their own resources. And I would say that you probably have created a cycle of dependency with this person in your life, where you both hold on to the story that they are not capable. And your judgment of their decisions, is based on YOUR values, beliefs, assumptions, standards, and worldview. It’s because YOU would not make that kind of decision, and hence you are judging them for making a decision that doesn’t align with your worldview.

Of course, it’s different when we have children. When children are small, they are still developing the capacity to make decisions, to honour their own values, to execute on their values, etc., and they need guidance. And even here, we notice that at some point, trying to control them, or force them to do what we want them to do, is not always the best way. They might stubbornly persist in their “bad” decisions anyway. And what they need most, is someone who will hold space, who won’t judge, who will believe in their ability to be naturally resourceful, creative, and whole.

I saw this time and again working with students. My choice was always to hold students as capable of showing up and doing the work. I did not buy into any of the stories they believed about their capacity as students if those stories did not serve them. AND I told them the truth. I would share what I was seeing. I would tell a student the truth when I thought they were not showing up fully, or when I thought they were not putting in the work, or if I could see that they have amazing potential, but that their attitude sucks. I would share the truth they needed to hear, because it might sting to receive the truth in the moment, but in the long run, they were better off. They had the information to make informed decisions.

So many times, students who were failing in other classes started showing up in mine, started putting in the hard work it required to pass a subject, started cleaning up their act, and would come back later and thank me for telling them the truth. We all want to be held as capable. We all need just ONE person to believe in us as humans.

Every time I have worked for a boss who believed I was capable of more than I saw for myself, I exceeded my own expectations of what I thought was possible. When I started working with my coach, she saw who I could become long before I saw it, and she patiently waited for me to start seeing it too. She held me as naturally resourceful, creative, and whole, and she simply would not buy into my stories of lack and inadequacy, and not enoughness that I was running. She challenges any belief I hold that says I’m not capable, or I don’t have what it takes, or I don’t have a choice, because she knows I always have a choice. I am the owner of my life. I choose. And if I want to create something in my life, I will find a way to do it.

Experiencing the power of that in my own life, has helped me do that for my clients too. I don’t buy into their stories of stuckness, lack, inadequacy, not enoughness, victimhood. I don’t let them collapse into believing they are less than they are. I hold their dream for them, and I insist that they claim it for themselves. And I do so with honesty and humility, knowing that I’m not perfect, I don’t always get it right, and it’s my job to tell them the truth they need to hear that no-one else is willing to say to them.

I tell them the truth they already know is there, but that no-one has the courage to reflect back to them. And I help them see that they get to decide what they want to do with it. And that they always have a choice about who they want to be in the world and what they want to do in the world.

And all these new developments unfolding in the world has us taking choice out of the hands of those who are responsible for making those choices. We are disrespecting each individual’s right to make their own choices about their bodies and their lives. We are pretending to know what’s best for another human being, when we can NEVER know what is best for another person. We can NEVER know the spiritual curriculum they are meant to complete, the life lessons they are meant to learn, the person they are intended to become. We can never know what only THEY can know on the inside to be true for them.

My heart aches when I think about this. And I can feel the rage rising up inside of me. I don’t want to live in a world where we revoke people’s right to choose. I don’t want to live in a world where people do not enjoy equal freedoms to take full responsibility for their own lives and happiness.

And in this moment, I recognise that sometimes, in some situations, rage is divine. Rage is what is needed. Rage is the greatest act of kindness. In the words of Valarie Kaur, “The aim of divine rage is not vengeance, but to reorder the world.” Vengeance does not serve here but raging against any system or person that robs you of your dignity as an autonomous person responsible for your own life and happiness, is true compassion. It’s an act that creates space for all of us to discover our power to create lives that are personally meaningful.

Let us never forget to meet each other where we are. I can never fully know another’s journey, but I can serve as a compassionate companion; someone who refrains from platitudes and judgments, someone who recognises myself in the other, and who invites them to see themselves as whole, as resourceful, as capable of choosing.

References:

1. Devine, M. (2017). It’s OK That You’re Not OK: Meeting grief and loss in a culture that doesn’t understand. Boulder, Colorado: Sounds True.
2. Ferrucci, P. (2007). The Power of Kindness: The unexpected benefits of leading a compassionate life. New York: Tarcher Perigree.