Inhale/Exhale

June 15th, 2011

Compassion can easily go two ways. You can completely open yourself up to others, take on their anxieties and pain and lose yourself in the process. Or, you can stay closed up and cut them off to preserve your sense of self. I have been to both schools. Through the course of this education, I learned one thing. It can’t be one way or the other. Compassion needs to be lived in our lives in somewhat of a balance. We have to stay close, present, and caring without taking on the pain and anxieties of others and risk losing our sense of self.

Finding a self that was lost inside of another is like separating two pieces of wood with a crowbar. The splitting and cracking as each piece moves in opposite directions, leaves open wounds on both pieces. Layers of wood filler and repeated sanding is needed to make each piece smooth again. I remember my wood filler and sanding days. They would take me by surprise. There was the day I took myself for a walk to the corner store and treated myself to afternoon coffee. My step was light and I felt like I deserved it. There was the day I put a chair on the patio on the first warm day after a long, cold winter. I simply sat and looked at my little zen garden and marveled that I could enjoy something again. I remember leaving the house in recent weeks with a spring in my step more days than not. These are the wood filler days. Then there are the sanding days where tears still spring up unexpectedly. One day the finish will be applied and the self will be preserved; a porous finish that will allow compassion to flow in and out, leaving the self intact.

This was in my morning reading today. It helps instill the balance:

~Sit quietly and bring to mind a time when you lost yourself in another’s problem.
~Center yourself and bring to mind a time when you maintained your sense of self, but cut off another to do so.
~Breath thoroughly and try to let the two feelings coexist: compassion and sense of self.
~Inhale. Sense of self. Exhale. Compassion.
~Inhale. Sense of self. Exhale. Compassion.

And so, as another day goes by, “in balance” is the way to live, and I have written.