The purpose of compassion in dark times
Do you remember the first time you learned about the horrors of war in school? I have strong memory of a particular moment in my education. I can see the photos of Auschwitz, Hitler and Anne Frank’s diary in the textbook and I can feel my young self flooded with sadness, confusion and anger. I remember my classmates echoing my thoughts, asking , “how did this happen?” not comprehending how people allowed it all to take place. I felt sure I would have ‘done something’, had I been around at the time, without knowing what exactly. This feeling is the innate human experience of compassion. Something that comes much easier to children than adults.
When I worked as a TA several years ago, I saw the same outrage and confusion in the year 5 children we taught during a history lesson that included concentration camps, the first time these kids had heard of something so terrible. As one memorable student whispered to me at the time “Hitler was such a dick!” to which I simply nodded. There wasn’t a child in the room who didn’t express, in some way, their compassion.
Back in the present day, and once again I am overwhelmed by the suffering in the world that’s brought about by powerful and unhinged men. This overwhelm is not uncommon or unreasonable for therapists, care workers, journalists, aid workers, empaths, activists or frankly anyone who is paying attention and has a heart. The contributors were the usual suspects; the climate crisis, seemingly endless violence in the middle east, Donald fucking Trump, the cost of living in the UK and the suffering of loved ones.
Sadness, frustration and overwhelm are simply natural responses to engaging with these things. Whilst the overwhelm is understandable, I didn’t want to get stuck in it. Especially not when I have clients to support; my work requires a balance of me being a messy human just like everyone else and a regulated, stable and safe presence.
I did two things that always help me when I feel overwhelmed: I walked in nature and I turned to a trusted teacher.
The walk in nature helped me be with my feelings in a less intense way and I was able to notice beauty, pause and breathe for a moment. I had a little perspective and my mind was quieter.
But it’s the teacher and her words that I wanted to share here because a) I already bang on so much about the benefits of nature connection and b) I was helped so much by listening to her, not just in the moment of overwhelm but in a way that put me back on a path I’d accidentally wandered away from.
The teacher I turned to was Tara Brach, who I’ve been a fan of for many years now. It’s not an exaggeration to say her book Radical Acceptance changed my life. In a serendipitous moment, just as I was thinking “I need some guidance, I’m drifting around in this overwhelm, who could help pull me out?” her email dropped into my inbox. Meet suffering with an open heart was the subject line. I eagerly opened her message and clicked the link to watch the video.
Every word she spoke made sense to me and I was instantly soothed by the reminder that my struggle is not unique, I am feeling something that others feel too and understand. She spoke eloquently and in depth about the purpose and practice of compassion, how vital it is for hope, growth and meaningful change. There was a lot of wisdom shared in her conversation with Dan Harris of Ten Percent Happier and you can of course listen to it yourself, but here’s just two takeaways that really stood out for me:
TAKEAWAY ONE:
Most of the world’s problems, especially the cycles of trauma and violence, stem from people’s inability to be with and regulate their own emotions. Emotions themselves are harmless. Read that again: emotions themselves do not cause harm. How we react to those emotions, how we behave because of those emotions causes harm (check out my ‘No Bad Feelings’ blog for more on this).
When faced with violence, suffering and injustice it is tempting indeed to push it away and not engage with our feelings. If we are privileged to be witnessing painful events through screens and print rather than experiencing them first hand then of course it makes sense to be mindful of how much we expose ourselves to it. No engagement at all is effectively avoidance and denial, which have their own internal consequences. Constant engagement can only result in overwhelm and burnout, which helps no-one. So the middle path has to be some engagement which means being able to feel the fear and grief that lie underneath the anger and blaming we so easily latch onto when faced with unbearable suffering.
Being able to feel, and therefore to begin to regulate, your feelings isn’t really possible without compassion.
Compassion for yourself, experiencing the heart-breaking helplessness of seeing awful things take place that you can’t stop or even fully process.
Compassion for those who are suffering; bearing witness to their pain.
Compassion even for those who perpetrate the problems, whose own psyche’s are damaged when they harm others and who are stuck in pointless cycles of unhealed trauma. They too are suffering (this is not an excuse, just a wider perspective). Tara says “your heart has to break for everyone”.
Put your hand over your heart. Breathe. Allow yourself to feel it. You can. You can. You can.
For support with difficult emotions, I used the RAINN practice, created by Tara Brach. Here is my adaptation of it.
TAKEAWAY TWO:
“Compassion is only soft if it stays on the cushion” - compassion in our minds and hearts through meditation is the foundation of compassionate action. It’s the doing, fuelled by the compassion we’ve quietly cultivated, that helps, heals and changes lives.
When I did my Compassion Focused Therapy training a few years ago I realised I had never really understood that compassion isn’t just a feeling, it's a motivation. A motivation to reduce or remove suffering. It has an active element to it, which might be an internal shift, the words you speak or a physical action. Or all the above!
To continue to work through our overwhelm, grief, anger or despair we must act on our compassion and find even a tiny scrap of hope that to do so is worthwhile.
“People speak of hope as if it is this delicate, ephemeral thing made of whispers and spiders' webs. it's not. Hope has dirt on her face, blood on her knuckles and the grit of cobblestone in her hair” - Bishop Kym Lucas
I suppose that I have been feeling guilty, to my inner child, for not being the adult I had imagined could stop the bad things from happening. When I became conscious of this, I was able to feel compassion for myself: for the appalled child facing the cruelty in the world who wanted someone to stop it from happening and for the adult me who cares deeply and would make everything lovely for everyone if only I had the power to do so. But I don’t have that power, no single person does. But I do have compassion. And that is important.
So, I watched the video of Tara’s conversation (twice actually) and made a lot of notes. I felt my feelings, letting them pass like a storm rolling through, and thought about compassion as action. Her question “what is love asking of me right now?” floats gently but persistently through my mind.
I’ve accepted that I’m not a superhero, or even an activist really. I’m allowing my work, my personal peace and my care for people I come into contact with to be enough. Deciding what my own responses to political and world events will be is an ongoing process, but what I’ve decided for now is that expanding my own capacity for compassion is the most purposeful things I can do, and here’s some ways I will do that:
Increase practices that help me cultivate and maintain my own peace. Specifically the metta bhavana mediation practice, amongst others. This is with the intention to be part of the solution, not the problem.
Be direct about asking people how they are affected by world events, when appropriate.
Continue to create a safe place for clients to express and work through any feelings connected to injustice, harm and trauma.
Look up and engage with local activist groups connected to causes I care about. Consider what time/energy/money/skills I can give/share with them.
Notice and correct when I see or even create division amongst people, avoid engaging in these sorts of conversations socially. Slagging off ‘the other side’ only perpetuates the problems.
The purpose of compassion is to keep us connected to our innate love of life. Being in touch with pain, our own and of others, is to remind us we care, that we our hearts are still beating in our bodies and our minds are still alive with the desire for connection, safety and peace.
“Compassion is not a relationship between the healer and the wounded. It’s a relationship between equals. Only when we know our own darkness well can we be present with the darkness of others. Compassion becomes real when we recognize our shared humanity.” - Brené Brown
Reflection:
What part of yourself do you need to bring compassion to right now?
What would more compassionate action look like in your life, for the people and causes you care about?
