The Compassion Ladder

Does something - a person, an idea, a revelation - ever find you in the right place and at the right time so much so that all the air leaves your body and your feet become stuck to the ground like quicksand is dragging you into the earth?

I had one of those moments earlier this week. I was walking up and down the same road I walk up and down every day when (one of my largest inspirations - a shame researcher with enough honesty, hilarious wit, and intellect to fill the Burj Khalifa) Brene Brown whispered something in my ear that floored me with enlightenment, sadness, and hope all at once. I thought to myself as my body became frozen in the vastness of space, "I am a near enemy of fierce compassion."

This probably means nothing to you and last week it didn't mean anything to me either, but this week it means everything to me because, in a matter of seconds, it changed my perspective on what it means to play an active role in enriching the human experience.

I was listening to an episode from Brene's podcast Unlocking Us called Brene with Chris Germer on the Near and Far Enemies of Fierce Compassion, where I first learned about the concepts of near enemies and far enemies. These concepts are derived from Buddhist psychology and are usually applied to the four immeasurables: loving-kindness, compassion, sympathetic joy, and equanimity. The four immeasurables are qualities of being, that when manifested inside of us allow us to experience life in a beautiful way, even if the world we live in is one of suffering, hardship, and social injustice. In order to understand the concepts of near and far enemies, we must understand specifically one of the four immeasurables: compassion.

In compassion, like every other corner of our interconnected world, there exists a duality of lightness and darkness that complement one another and live in harmony. Most of us understand this to be the yin and the yang. The yin side of compassion, being the nurturing side of compassion, is the one we accept most predominantly in western nations, but if the Buddhists are right, then there also exists a darker side of compassion. The yang side of compassion represents protecting others in need and doing what is right even when it is hard. Throughout the podcast, the yang side of compassion takes on the name fierce compassion, the type of compassion that requires courage and strength to confront challenges head-on and take the action to change them.

Where this concept of fierce compassion really struck me was the fact that Brene and Chris were talking about social justice issues. Up until a few weeks ago, before I wrote my letter to the Senate about workplace discrimination, for 24 years of my life, I had not taken one step into the social justice ring, I had even not paid the PPV fee to watch the fight on TV, in fact, I decided that the world was a better place without another uneducated white girl's opinion on any social justice topic blaring in our media headlines. The guilt rolled in on tsunami-sized waves.

Big yikes.

At this point in the podcast, I was about to learn what fierce compassion looks like and what its two ugly step sisters - the near enemy of compassion and far enemy of compassion - look like too. If I didn't already have my pride handed to me butchered and covered in gravy on a platter, then I was about to.

A fiercely compassionate individual is one who has mastered the three elements of compassion: loving kindness, common humanity, and mindfulness. One rung down from fierce compassion is a near enemy - near enemies are states that appear similar to the desired quality but actually undermine it. For me, the easiest way to comprehend the concept is to understand that pity as opposed to kindness, sameness as opposed to common humanity, and complacency as opposed to mindfulness are the near enemies of compassion. I realized through these words that I am a repeat offender of confusing sameness with compassion - this looks like minimizing a cause based on the notion that we are all "one". One too many times I have caught myself saying, "there is so much emphasis on the ways that we are different from one another and not enough focus on the fact that we are all human beings." In these moments, I am neglecting to realize that I am diminishing and marginalizing the experience of others by not focusing on the very significant differences that separate me from individuals of a different race, ethnicity, or sexual orientation. Those differences in experience deserve fierce compassion; a compassion that fights to elevate those voices and bring action to the injustice that they suffer from. Likewise, I have found myself exhibiting examples of pity and complacency; instead of working to dismantle injustices that have unfolded right in front of my eyes, I have chosen to be quiet, and instead of truly choosing to open up my heart to the pain and suffering that others may face, I have chosen pity, a state that implies I am looking down on someone I see as different from myself.

Gosh darn it Brene, I always learn something from you but I really didn't want to learn this one.

I have always considered myself to be a compassionate person but this podcast forced me into a small closet with a mirror and no choice other than to stand to recognize that the person I was looking at only demonstrates compassion in some departments of her life. Fierce compassion is a practice, a practice that does not discriminate one moment from the next, and one that I am absolutely no master of.

The good news is that I learned I am absolutely not a far enemy of compassion and I was able to wipe the pooling sweat off my eyebrows and unfurl my deeply scrunched forehead. Unlike near enemies, far enemies are the opposite of what we are trying to achieve. A far enemy does not strive to exhibit kindness, they strive to demonstrate cruelty. In place of mindfulness, we will see emotional reactivity, in place of common humanity, we will see demonizing, and in place of loving-kindness, we will see hostility.

The epiphany that made me realize I am not fiercely compassionate in all aspects of my life brought inevitable sadness, but that sadness was quickly replaced by a sense of new hope and opportunity. The path to mindfulness, common humanity and loving-kindness will not be a simple journey, it will be a life-long journey that requires me to take action even when it's hard, feel the pain of others as if it were my own, and remain open to learning the experiences of others every step of the way.

As I've digested Brene's words more and more over the past few days, I've started to think about fierce compassion as a mental model that I can apply in my everyday life. How can I take such a complicated, layered topic and simplify it so I can start to become a master of compassionate living?

The Compassion Ladder

Let's go on a quick trip together to the middle of a bustling city. We are walking to a coffee shop and all of a sudden we witness a moment of social injustice that stops us in our tracks, except the injustice was happening on top of an office building that was out of reach. We recognized that there was a ladder leaning up against the side of the building but the building is tall and we are deeply afraid of heights. For some reason, women and men in pinstripe suits were barely allowing their eyes to meet the situation taking place above them for more than a few seconds, or just long enough to whip out their phones and snap a picture. We recognize that this is an opportunity to confront this injustice and we ask ourselves the necessary questions:

Am I being emotionally reactive? No | Am I demonizing the victim? No | Am I inflicting greater suffering through hostility? No

I am not a far enemy of compassion

Am I going to be a complacent bystander? No, I know that walking away from this ladder would be easier than climbing it, but I will choose the hard thing | Am I demonstrating sameness? No | Do I feel pity? No

I am not a near enemy of compassion

Finally, have I reached kindness, common humanity, and mindfulness? Will I be wise enough to choose the actions with the greatest long-term benefit? Will I fight even when it is hard?

Yes - at this moment, I can be fiercely compassionate. I will take the necessary action to pursue peace and equity.

This was a long one, thanks for sticking with me through it! This newsletter was focused on compassion for others, not self-compassion, which I believe to have equal weight and significance. Regarding self-compassion, I'll leave you with this:

Thanks for reading - see you here next week