Category Archives: Compassion

Wishcasting Wednesday

12 Replies

What do you wish to walk away from?

Fear, worry, and anxiety. This is something to stop doing in general, to let go of no matter when or why it arises, but specifically there is one way this manifests for me in my life that is completely toxic: worry about those I love. The one thing I can count on, all of us can, is impermanence.  Everyone we love, including ourselves, is going to die, cease to exist, become inaccessible as a physical form, is finite and mortal. This is true, and fear, worry, or anxiety won’t change that, won’t protect me. And yet, I am constantly being triggered–any time the dogs are sick or hurt, any time Eric drives away from me in a car or I get on a plane, every time I hear yet another story about someone in my family making a bad choice, or see them struggling or sick. Their suffering is out of my control and a constant reminder of my biggest fear, that one day we will lose each other. We will disappoint and hurt each other. I will abandon them or they will leave me, one way or another we will be separated.

I wish to walk away from fear, worry, and anxiety, and lean into joy, soften to love, welcome and embrace reality.

Numbing. This is a response to fear, discomfort, lack of appropriate self-care. I feel the twinge of anxiety about a situation and I want to numb myself to that ache. I’m tired, but my mind is pushing, insisting, “keep working, keep doing, just one more thing and you can stop” and I want to numb out and release myself. There are better ways to cope, I know that and yet I don’t always make the best choices, sometimes slip into old, deep habits and ways of being. I want to know deep in my bones that facing reality, the vulnerability, discomfort and pain of the moment, even the possibility of getting my ass kicked by it is better than being numb. Brene’ Brown says, in Gifts of Imperfection,

[T]here’s no such thing as selective emotional numbing. There is a full spectrum of human emotion and when we numb the dark, we numb the light. While I was “taking the edge off” of the pain and vulnerability, I was also unintentionally dulling my experience of good feelings, like joy…When we lose our tolerance for discomfort, we lose joy.

I wish to walk away from numbing and into a full, wholehearted experience of my life.

Busyness and exhaustion. I get too busy and won’t allow myself to rest. When this goes on for too long, I become depleted and start to struggle in all kinds of ways, all areas of my life. Work is harder, even play becomes difficult. I become irritable, easily frustrated, and confused. Illness finds a way in. It’s more difficult to make decisions and my priorities aren’t clear. I get overwhelmed and stuck, or speedy and sloppy, accident prone. I make poor choices about how to care for myself. I push past my limits, smash myself to bits, eat too much of the wrong things, don’t get the exercise or rest I need, have a nasty internal dialogue, falter in my commitments and practices, abandon and mistreat what and whom I love.

I wish to walk away from busyness and exhaustion, and towards rest, play, stillness, calm, and self-care.

Criticism and judgement. This helps nothing, no one. Rejecting the way things are doesn’t change the way things are. Pointing out the weakness of others, highlighting their mistakes, focusing on their confusion doesn’t make you strong. Love and acceptance, equanimity, truly is the healthiest place/way to be. And you might think that if you are only critical of yourself and not others–which usually isn’t the case, typically if you are doing it to yourself you can’t help but pass it on, but if you were able to pull it off–this kind of self harm ripples out, is not self contained.

I was thinking about this yesterday when I was watching an interview with a woman who had struggled with an eating disorder and body image issues in the past, and described herself as “horribly fat” at a moment of her unhealthy past, but the number she gave is my current weight…what she labeled “horribly fat.” I am aware enough to know that numbers are relative, and that her “fat” number doesn’t make me fat, but what I did realize in thinking through it is that if you don’t practice kindness, gentleness towards yourself, even your past troubled self, you will find yourself inadvertently criticizing every person who is like that, now or still. Comparison, criticism, being unforgiving does so much harm, generates so much shame, pain, and suffering.

“If you judge people, you have no time to love them.” ~Mother Teresa

I want to walk away from criticism and judgement, and walk in a spirit of equanimity, compassion, and love.

Three Truths and One Wish

3 Replies

Right Speech, also called Wise Speech or Virtuous Speech, is speech that gives rise to peace and happiness in oneself and others…the word “Right” is not a moral judgment to be contrasted with bad or wrong, but means “leading to happiness for oneself and others.” ~Beth Roth, Family Dharma: Right Speech Reconsidered

Right Speech is something I think about a lot, something I try to practice in my personal life and in my writing. For example, on this blog I make choices about what to write about, what to share based on the principles of right speech–which means there are some things that are happening in my life that I don’t talk about here. It can be strange for the people in my life who know what’s going on. Just this weekend, my mom asked me if there was something she didn’t know about, something that was worrying me, bothering me, that I’d said something on the blog that made her think there was–and there is, but she already knows about it, it’s nothing new, I simply chose to not share the specific details here in my posts. It’s not because I am trying to be dishonest or less than wholehearted and authentic, but that I am considering the three truths of Right Speech.

1. Truth: Right Speech is true. Sometimes we say something before we know if it’s really true or not, or when there’s no way for us to know if it’s true. Maybe we even preface it with, “well I heard,” thinking that gets us off the hook, but still we are essentially telling a lie, a non-truth. Sometimes we exaggerate or over generalize, saying something about everyone who belongs to a different political party or religion or culture, not really knowing if that’s true and certainly knowing it can’t be true of “all of them.”

image by pittaya sroilong

Sometimes what we say is a belief formed in a state of confusion (or passion, or anger), and even if we aren’t entirely sure if our perception is accurate, we pass it along as fact. I do this to my husband when I’m upset or irritated and I start a phrase with “you always…” or I try to tell him what he thinks or really meant to say, simply because in my confused, upset condition it’s how I’m choosing to see things, to be hurt or to pick a fight, either way casting him as the one at fault, as the enemy. Practicing Right Speech would mean that I instead took a breath, explained that I was upset and not seeing things clearly.

2. Truth: Right Speech is compassionate. It is kind, peaceful, promotes harmony and good will, comforts, encourages, inspires, is gentle. It’s kind of like what your mom always told you: “if you can’t say something nice, don’t say anything at all.” That can sound hokey, childish even, but think about it–what is your response when someone speaks harshly or aggressively to you? Does that kind of talk, that tone make you feel peaceful or happy, loving towards the one speaking? Or does it make you want to smack someone in the mouth?

It’s also a common parenting tip: if your child is having a meltdown, ignore them, or if they are yelling, rather than yelling back and escalating the situation, you should try whispering. I see this even with my dogs. If they are barking at something, me yelling at them to “be quiet!” is essentially me barking too and doesn’t really stop them, but if I walk up close to them and quietly say “shhhh,” they usually can be interrupted, calmed down. Compassionate Right Speech means don’t instigate a fight, and don’t get hooked by someone else trying to start one with you. Make an attempt to avoid speech that would hurt or harm.

3. Truth: Right Speech is helpful. Say what is useful, purposeful, necessary, wise. Words can nourish or poison, harm or help, and it’s clear which is preferable. There are situations where I see people I love making the same dumb mistakes, over and over, and I get to the point where I am so frustrated, I want to tell them how dumb they are being, and how irritating it is, to judge and criticize them, but I stop myself, because it wouldn’t be helpful.

image by marc falardeau

And when we offer advice, we have to carefully consider who we are talking to, what their circumstance are, what they are ready to hear and to do. Sometimes, even if we can see clearly what they should do, what would make them happy, they might be too deep in their confusion about their situation, their resistance to reality too strong, and they might not be ready for advice, for a challenge to their current perspective or position. A simpler example of this might be yelling at a homeless person to “get a job!,” (actually, that statement in that situation might fail all three principles of Right Speech).

One wish: That we all commit wholeheartedly to speech that gives rise to peace and happiness in ourselves and others. That we chose our words carefully, making sure that they are true, compassionate, and helpful. And in the moments we can’t seem to do so, we are able to remain silent, quiet with our struggle rather than actively generating suffering or mindlessly chattering. And that we understand the principles of Right Speech should also be applied to our internal dialogues, those secret conversations we have with ourselves, and that we practice truth, kindness, and wisdom there as well.