To behold the face of the other

“Compassion asks us to go where it hurts, to enter into the places of pain, to share in brokenness, fear, confusion, and anguish. Compassion challenges us to cry out with those in misery, to mourn with those who are lonely, to weep with those in tears. Compassion requires us to be weak with the weak, vulnerable with the vulnerable, and powerless with the powerless. Compassion means full immersion in the condition of being human.” (Henri J.M. Nouwen)

“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.” (Pema Chödrön) 

“How much can we ever know about the love and pain in another heart? How much can we hope to understand those who have suffered deeper anguish, greater deprivation, and more crushing disappointments than we ourselves have known?” (Orhan Pamuk)

“Compassion alone stands apart from the continuous traffic between good and evil proceeding within us.” (Eric Hoffer)

“With the afflicted be afflicted in mind.” (Saint Isaac the Syrian)

There are words which not only sound deliciously beautiful [melliferous, cinnamon, tantalizing, felicity], but which also carry a deeper and more revealing resonance [nostalgia, astronomy, angelic, philosophy]. And then there are others, the same beautiful and resonant, which go even further. To reveal profound practical realities once broken free from their etymological shell [compassion, companion, communion, compunction]. Here I would like to stop on a word which if we should stay to consider it in all of its wonder and implication, would bring us to tears. This is probably my favourite word: compassion. Compassion from Middle English: via Old French from ecclesiastical Latin compassio(n- ), from compati  ‘suffer with’. It is a “sympathetic consciousness of others' distress together with a desire to alleviate it.”[1]

Source: https://orthodoxartsjournal.org/st-peter-on-the-right-st-paul-on-the-left/

Love itself presupposes the movement of compassion for to begin with, love proceeds from a “strong affection”. If I have no compassion for you, then it stands to reason that my confession of love will not stand, it will not hold up. It would be like building a house on unstable ground. This is what the traditional words of the marriage vow: “[f]or better, for worse… in sickness and health”, are meant to convey. “Compassion is the greatest form of love humans have to offer” (Rachael Joy Scott). A truth which this inspirational young soul, who lost her life in Columbine far too soon, learnt early in her growing years. Love and compassion go hand in hand. I will stay with you, and if need be when that time arrives, I will share in your suffering and I will be there for you. I will co-suffer with you. I want for us to be part of each other’s redemption. To behold the face of the other. Like the heart-warming icon of the reconciliation of Saints Peter and Paul.

Compassion inspires hope, that feeling of trust and expectation, when everything around us might seem dark. We all do battle with our lives, oftentimes this battle is an inward one and it can frighten us to ‘conspire’ with harmful responses. Other times we cannot hide our sufferings and it is public for all to see, as was for example, the tribulation of the prophet Job. He was to ultimately through his steadfastness, experience both the compassion and the mercy of his Creator (Job 42:7-17). Those that love us will have compassion for us, they will extend their hand, put us in their embrace. They remind us of those good and vital things which we may well have forgotten, or which might now seem blunt. They give us hope and point us in the right direction.

“To be compassionate requires attention, insight, and engagement”, a religious has somewhere very well said. Even as the ‘leper priests’ did at the deepest level when they willingly entered into leper colonies to offer hope and succour to the suffering. We are no longer expected to do this, but let us think on this for a moment, we have become hesitant to even shake the other’s hand. Leo Buscaglia, the widely beloved philosopher and educator, reflecting on the meaning of life after the tragic loss of his student: “Too often we underestimate the power of a touch, a smile, a kind word, a listening ear, an honest compliment, or the smallest act of caring, all of which have the potential to turn a life around.” This “power of touch” has nowadays taken on a new meaning. Masks, gloves, and social distancing. People dying without holding the hand of a loved one. Never before have we realized the vitalness of the power of touch. And of the magnitude of compassion.

We have seen that one of the evidences of compassion is to let the other know you are there for them. To speak words of comfort and succour into their ear. Don’t tell them that you understand, because in all likelihood you don’t, but do tell them that your empathy is borne from your own life-experiences. Thirst is a stranger to none. Nor is despair. Sometimes, too, when we express compassion, we might at the same time have to give the ‘benefit of the doubt’, to hold back on any judgements. In Buddhism compassion requires prajna [transcendental wisdom], that is, an ability to get past the shallow appearances and to discern the true suffering and needs of the other. This is to go deeper, if at all possible, to practise “compassionate empathy” when we are “spontaneously moved to help”.[2] In the Quran compassion is the most frequently occurring word and is often connected to mercy (7:156). Mercy is normally associated to the giving of forgiveness, so there will be occasions when we could be called to practise compassion by forgiving those who have hurt us, when they might not have known any better. “Jesus said, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what they are doing” (Lk. 23:34).

There will be days when we are tired or overburdened, or indeed suffering ourselves. When we cannot be the support we would want to be. The additional weight might be too much for us to bear for the moment. Even here, we need to make use of our discernment. Milan Kundera, the Czech writer best known as the author of The Unbearable Lightness of Being has described this very honestly, “[f]or there is nothing heavier than compassion. Not even one's own pain weighs so heavy as the pain one feels with someone, for someone, a pain intensified by the imagination and prolonged by a hundred echoes.” What then? Do not feel guilty, for if you break down, you would be of no help to anyone. Emotional exhaustion [or even ‘pathological’ appropriation] is never a good thing. But try best you can, not to ignore the others cry, if you can. A letter. Or a card. Or an email. All this does help. And even if this is too difficult, then a prayer said with compassion, whatever the workings of prayer, is not lost. “But truly God has listened; he has attended to the voice of my prayer” (Ps. 66:19).

Many would be familiar with the Parable of the Good Samaritan one of the most beloved gospel stories from the New Testament (Lk. 10:25-37). The Samaritan at great risk to his own self, shows empathy and practises compassion to care for his Jewish neighbour who was beset by highway robbers and left to die. At the time the Samaritans and the Jews were at enmity one with the other. Others passed by the wounded and dying man and given their profession, you would have expected for them to stop. But they did not. They did not practise compassion. They kept going. But the good Samaritan stopped to give comfort and to care for his neighbour. He practised both compassion and mercy. And he was greatly commended by Christ that we might also follow in his example, “Go and do likewise” (Lk. 10:37). Compassion has no interest for race and is blind to the colour of my skin. It does not ask for my creed. It offers itself freely like a beatitude. Martin Luther King, Jr., loved this parable and made frequent use of it. He understood the road “from Jerusalem to Jericho” where the story unfolded as one which must be transformed so that true compassion is “not haphazard and superficial”. He knew too well that words devoid of truth are meaningless. So did the good Samaritan who did more than just “bandage” the wounds. Even the irascible Schopenhauer had recognized, "[c]ompassion is the basis of morality". It is a little more complicated than this long established aphorism, but it's truthful enough [3].

Why is it we naturally expect compassion for ourselves when at the same time we can often hold it back from others? This is a difficult question and it can challenge us. Only by looking deep into our hearts can we arrive at some answer, and even then, given any unpleasant discoveries, there remains the likelihood the response will not be entirely honest. We expect compassion because we are human and typically fragile. It is a healing balm. A medicine to the soul. “When we’re looking for compassion, we need someone who is deeply rooted, is able to bend and, most of all, embraces us for our strengths and struggles” writes the author of the Call to Courage, Brené Brown. There are times when we might hold back on this very same compassion, not because we are bad or wicked, no, but precisely because we are fragile and contradictory. Some could be normally suspicious, on account that practising compassion might mean giving the “benefit of the doubt” something which may possibly not come easy.

It will mean revealing the vulnerable side of ourselves at the same time. This could frighten us. And yet love, compassion, and vulnerability, are interlinked. Be certain on them, nothing in the world is more powerful or liberating. We have seen this manifested in history and in the lives of people time and again. It is the revelation to our hearts that we are not ‘existences’ in isolation one from the other. A universal idea so well synopsized by the well-known American Trappist monk, Thomas Merton, “[t]he whole idea of compassion is based on a keen awareness of the interdependence of all these living beings, which are all part of one another, and all involved in one another.” To love is to feel good, the heightened feeling of “communion” [from communionem, meaning "fellowship, mutual participation, or sharing."[4] To experience a profound pleasure in giving to the other. It is the same with the practice of compassion.

[1] https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/compassion

[2] http://www.danielgoleman.info/three-kinds-of-empathy-cognitive-emotional-compassionate/

[3] https://gophilosophy.wordpress.com/2014/06/18/compassion-is-the-basis-of-morality-schopenhaueressay-by-ivan-medenica

[4] https://www.etymonline.com/word/communion

On dealing with abandonment

“You have caused my friends to abandon me; you have made me repulsive to them. I am closed in and cannot escape.”  (Ps. 88:8)

Source: https://www.pinterest.com.au/pin/479774166552058734/

Many of us will feel a sense of abandonment at some time during our lives. Words which are synonymous reveal the dreadfulness of this experience: betrayal, neglect, rejection, desertion, discarded. “Abandonment” is etymologically connected to “ban” (to prohibit or prevent). It seems that at every turn we are stopped or obstructed. All of a sudden, the lights are out. The rooms are dark, both literally and metaphorically. Abandonment can soon lead to the abject feeling of hopelessness. When we feel abandoned, disconnected, it is only natural to retreat. With retreat comes the inevitable isolation. We separate from people and things we love. We feel worthless. Left behind and cut off. Melancholia, as if quicksand, begins to draw us deeper into this place of inconsolable desolation. “I am unlovable”, we tell ourselves. This will only compound the agony of feeling utterly alone. Identity and personality are deconstructed, where it would seem to the one suffering that putting all of the ‘blocks’ back again, would be all, but impossible. And it is here, inside of this compressing horror, at its most brutal, and dangerous, that we have lost many people, including a large number of our young. This is what it can feel like, we are told. This “fear of emptiness” from which both the body and the mind plead for rescue and delivery.

“Have mercy upon me, O Lord, for I am in trouble: mine eye is consumed with grief, yea, my soul and my belly” (Ps. 31:9)

Who will listen to the cries of the suffering soul? Who can understand the desperation of a weeping heart? Who will pick up the phone at 4.00AM in the morning? “O, brother, where art thou?”  the spirit cries out. “I am here. Wait another day. All will be well.” Is it your own voice or that of the Creator? For now, it doesn’t matter. Do not concern yourself with this right now. Discernment will arrive in its own time. All that matters, even if it might seem you are all alone in the world, all that matters, is that I am here with you. I surround you. Even in your darkness, I surround you. Get through this, the storm cannot last forever, and another layer of your true name will be shown to you. This desolateness is my point of entry. All of these dreads you have been voicing to yourself are not true. There is a reality to them, yes, a substantiality, but they are not the final truth of who you are. Like your tears, the pain is very real, and yet much of the narrative belongs to your imagination. Do not allow for your phantasms to take over. Look beyond the exaggerations. You are much bigger than the walls you have built around yourself.

“Your heart is the size of an ocean. Go find yourself in its hidden depths.” (Rumi)

The most meaningful and enduring accomplishments have been born from within this darkness, when a bright light spills out of the endurance. Do not lose sight of this truth for others have been there before you. Christ was abandoned in Gethsemane by those closest to him and it is there he consents to save the world. King David penned his most propitious psalms when his sense of abandonment threatened to consume him whole. Saint John of the Cross wrote the greater part of the Spiritual Canticle locked away in a cell, abandoned and tormented by his brethren. It was in exile where the famed Persian poets, abandoned by their homeland and families, laid down a large deposit of their mystical splendour. Orphans which have been abandoned, some left on the streets of inhospitable cities, have grown to become benevolent souls of profound succour. The list is long because such suffering is not uncommon. Most of these conquerors have been anonymous. This too, you must take hold off and be strengthened, knowing that they were made of the very same stuff as you. 

“Out of suffering have emerged the strongest souls; the most massive characters are seared with scars.” (Kahlil Gibran)

In abandonment, if you can, love, even all the more. It is not impossible. It is there, in this self-surrender, in the places of your vulnerability, which is your truth, where the conquering is to be found. Little by little, one step at a time, hour by hour and day by day, draw back the curtains allow for the light to seep into your rooms. Into the wounds of your heart. Don’t give up yet, not now, when you are about to grow stronger. Persevere a little while longer in this trial. In this hour your cup is on the brink of overspilling with an incorruptible treasure. “Grace works best in the worst of conditions”, it has been said. Transformation, like Light, is also known by its baptisms of fire.

When you need a warm hug or a trusted ear, and there comes a time when we all do, reach out to someone you know, a soul which will not turn their back on you. There is always someone. And this too, which you are passing through now, my dearest A., like all things, it will pass.

“For I know the plans I have for you,” declares the Lord. “Plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you hope and a future.” (Jer. 29:11)

Compassion

Leunig KINDNESS: Never underestimate the ripple effect

“Compassion is sometimes the fatal capacity for feeling what it is like to live inside somebody else’s skin. It is the knowledge that there can never really be any peace and joy for me until there is peace and joy finally for you too.” (Frederick Buechner)

The word compassion has a beautiful sound to it. For a long time the word has had an ‘onomatopoeic’ association for the author of this humble reflection. He has connected it to a “bell”, a campana. Not only on account of the similarity in sound, but more so because of the visual image of a heart which strikes like a beautiful bell to bring hope to those nearby. Etymologically, compassion, is originally from the Latin: com [with] and pati [to suffer]. It literally means to suffer together with another. Is there anything in the world more valuable and full of potential than comprehending the pain of another and doing whatever we can to relieve that soul of some of its hurt? We look for that moment when we might jump into the water to save a drowning child or to show our courage by pulling out a stranger from a burning car. Yet these situations where great acts of bravery are required, will more likely than not, never be demanded of us. The irony is that every day we can perform such marvellous acts in different and no less significant ways.

To enter into the pain of another, to share in the affliction of my neighbour, to have empathy and then to go beyond it and to do something in response, that is compassion. To come to the aid of another, is a great step forward in our realization of what it means to be truly human. Buddhism teaches that to realize enlightenment there are two qualities which must be developed, these are wisdom and compassion. It is said that in the Qur’an compassion occurs more frequently than any other word. In the Judaeo-Christian scriptures compassion is at the core of its ethical revelation which for many is summarized in the “Golden Rule” of Christ: “So in everything, do to others what you would have them do to you, for this sums up the Law and the Prophets” (Matt 7:12). Compassion is to refuse to give in to hopelessness, not only in our reaching out to another, but also in the very act of loving ourselves. The often misinterpreted German philosopher Arthur Schopenhauer has put it succinctly, “Compassion is the basis of all morality”. It is also the seat of love for without it, love is without its flesh.

Compassion can be practised daily, in the ordinary things. If only we could know how many fires of human desperation we could extinguish by these simple and everyday acts. An uplifting letter of support to friend or stranger or better still, to a “foe” who might be suffering; the gift of your coat to somebody who is wet and cold; stepping into a hospital unannounced to ask if you might share some moments with the sick; practising the great art of forgiveness; taking the blame for another who might not possess your strength; stepping over an ant hill on your way to work; giving up your position in the queue to someone in a greater hurry than you; saying sorry when you don’t really have to; helping someone who is unsure cross the busy street; telling a blind man or woman that truly they are beautiful; sending a bouquet of flowers to a random address. Even a knowing smile can save a life. All of these things, this little list of charities which return to the giver a far greater blessing than what is given, have the potential to change lives. This person too, the recipient of your grace, will remember and add to this gift for it will invariably be paid forward.

Often enough compassion might be as simple an act as accepting each other, and understanding that each of us will grow and flourish in different times and in different places.

For others in those extreme places of unfathomable love and grace, compassion might well mean actual identification. As it did for those early missionaries who for the sake of their beloved lepers not only lived together with them in abandoned colonies, but also allowed for themselves to be stigmatized, literally, and to suffer alike in the flesh.

Here is the greatest strength of all, rising above our deepest fears and hidden prejudices. To step into the shoes of the other. There is the beginning.

“My dear Lord, please allow for these words, for these expressions of charity to take on flesh, that my desire to practise compassion becomes real and does not remain hollow. Allow for the eyes of my heart to see the presence of the Creator in each and every hand which might reach out to me.” 

On Being Rejected

“Every time you experience the pain of rejection, absence, or death, you are faced with a choice. You can become bitter and decide not to love again, or you can stand straight in your pain and let the soil on which you stand become richer and more able to give life to new seeds.” (Henri J. M. Nouwen)

http://www.curiositiesbydickens.com/

Few things hurt more than the sense or feeling of having been rejected. The pain can enter deep into the bone and marrow and it can ache for a long time, sometimes even a life-time. There are lots of ways which can conspire to make us feel like this: ranging from letters or emails which go unanswered, to losing out on a position for which you were ideally qualified, to being ignored by an old friend on the street, to not being selected in a sporting team, to being dismissed by colleagues and peers, to missing out on the love of a parent, to not having our affection or passion reciprocated. All this hurts, especially if rejection comes from someone we have loved and trusted or looked up to and admired. We are all afraid of rejection. It unconsciously conjures up sickening thoughts of what the word originally meant: “to throw” or “to throw back”. When we experience this emotion we can allow for it to make us feel ‘unloved’ and ‘irrelevant’. It is implied, we are not good, that we are not worthy of the other’s respect or attention and so we are excluded. We are, therefore, made to feel unimportant.

The results of rejection have brought to an end a great number of lives (there is more than one way that we can ‘end’ the life of another), and not surprisingly it is the common denominator to most forms of punishment. Nowadays, we also see this in cyber-bullying and other forms of online terrorizing, which includes the fickleness of ‘friendship’ on Facebook. The fear of rejection, particularly after we having experienced it, can stop us from moving on, it can leave us dead in our tracks. Self-esteem and self-worth can be destroyed. It need not be that way.

Many people from different walks of life have not only been able to rise above numerous rejections, but also to succeed in becoming illuminating signposts. The highest example for those who hold to the Christian faith is Jesus Christ, the GodMan, who was himself “despised” and “rejected” (Isa. 53:3) and during the darkest hours of his life abandoned even by his closest friends (Mk. 14:10-72). Afterwards this rejection would become the cornerstone for the theology of hope and the gift of eternal life (Titus 1:2).

Beethoven, arguably the world’s greatest composer was considered “hopeless” and “lacking in talent” when he was a young man, experiencing plentiful rejections at the hands of prominent music masters. The important lessons of self-belief and determination which he realized along the way would also help him later in life when he continued to compose after he had lost most of his hearing. Beethoven’s grandest work according to many and one of the most played symphonies in the world, Symphony No. 9 (“the Choral”), was composed when he was almost entirely deaf.

What do we learn from such extraordinarily resolute spirits? The lessons are not difficult to understand, and though it takes practice and perseverance to apply them, it can be done. That is, we do not give up; we do not lay down the arms. We refuse to surrender our future to those who might make sport of wounding our dignity. Of course, we are not Christ, and we might not possess the brilliance of Beethoven, yet both in their own very unique way were deeply and profoundly immersed in the potentials and possibilities of our shared humanity.

Rejection does not mean we are failures, often enough it might mean that we are different and “stand-out”. Being marginalized forces us to discover other ways to approach those things which we genuinely desire, and to reconsider afresh who and what truly matter. We learn that to be rejected does not define our identity or determine our self-worth (which can only ever be belittled or diminished by self-rejection). We no longer measure ourselves by another’s ‘yardstick’. Individual freedom is also re-defined. There are times, as well, when rejection is sent by providence to protect us from destructive influences. And importantly, we are forced to look more intensely into the great mystery of why we had life breathed into us in the first place.

On Suffering

“When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves.” Viktor E. Frankl, Man’s Search for Meaning (1946).

Léon Bonnat Job (C19th).

One of the most important confirmations that I have taken away after reading Viktor Frankl and from studying his Logotherapy is that we must detach from self-image, the source of our deepest suffering. This does not mean to deny our pain but we must not be consumed by it. It is the same with negative thoughts- do not fight them, let them go. Do not engage with that which cannot be reasoned. Carl Jung taught that ‘individuation’ begins with a “tremendous crisis” and that this is a personal journey. Suffering should be accepted, experienced, and dealt with. This is in refutation to the ‘new agers’ who bid us to go around our pain and not through it. But pain is real whether physical or emotional, and it must be confronted head-on otherwise there can be no resolution. That’s when life begins. Even in the context of childbirth, from here experience and growth come to us day by day, one step at a time. This is the meaning of suffering, to bear and to undergo, literally to carry. We can spend our lives denying this evident truth or accept its reality. We may never possess all the answers nor comprehend its origins and causes, but we can make our suffering redemptive and understand it as an opportunity for radical change.  And so when that time arrives when we too cry out, “Oh Lord, why has this dreadful thing happened to me?” we might respond in a way that new opportunities and another way might be revealed to us… as it did for Christ in Gethsemane that night when the answer which came back was that he might save the world.