The Next Wisest Thing
When we're at the edge, in danger of falling over the precipice into suffering, compassion is the most powerful means I know for keeping our feet firmly planted on the earth and our hearts wide open. - Roshi Joan Halifax
For those of us who want to be of benefit to some greater good, we walk what Joan Halifax calls the 'edge states.'
The edge state of altruism she describes as pathological altruism, or that excessive urge to 'help' that breeds intrusion, disrespect, exhaustion, resentment. That tries to chase away our ghost of need as Piepzna-Samarasinha describes, by involving ourselves in the needs of others.
- The edge state of empathy is empathic distress. "Feeling with" causes us to go down with the ship.
- The edge state of integrity is moral suffering, our struggle to know how to skillfully relate to moral conflicts, to systems that have moral conflicts within them, to not be complicit and yet how to not be feeding the egoic view that we are somehow morally superior.
- The edge state of respect for what is wholesome is judgment and disrespect for others who sit outside our understanding of 'goodness' and honor. The age old lesson that hate only begets more hate is present when we lose respect and compassion for others in our quest for a world built on our ideals.
- The edge state of engagement, of commitment to be on the frontlines... is burnout when we fail to include the barometer of our own wellbeing in the attention we give to making others or the world well.
There are always 2 sides to each coin.
What can bring benefit, without balance, will bring harm.
In all of the various caregiving paths that we work with at the Institute, there is a common theme.
How do we stay connected to the next wisest thing?
What will be beneficial?
How can we, as Halifax describes, not fall off the edge?
When we pay attention to the present moment with the calm, clarity that we've been exploring, we can see where we stand more clearly and, having found ourselves on the edge, pause, extend compassion, and step back on that ground in which we can actually be of benefit.
Then, and perhaps only then, can we do what is the wisest next thing.
We tend to believe that working 'tirelessly' towards causes that we value has exhaustion as it's price, as it's badge of honor.
What if we worked, instead, 'tenderly', with sensitivity to our own capacity and our own contribution in each moment?
We tend to think we have to fight for cures.
What if we, instead, nurtured healing possibilities?
We often take sides, fitting in with those whose views align with ours.
What if we, instead, took a stand.
We are often drowning in grief or are paralyzed by all that's undone.
What if we, instead, gave our full attention and full presence to what is front of us in this moment?
We can feel our contribution is inadequate, measure ourselves and our worth on some imagined scale.
What if we, instead, lived in our authenticity, saw that each of us is whole, and good enough, and that doing the next wisest, kindest thing, is all that we need to live out our purpose?
What if we remembered that the people who most inspire us, with whom we feel most cared for, are the people who show up fully, with tenderness, with healing presence, full attention, with that comforting sense that they are fully in their own skin, doing what comes naturally to them in this moment?
We forget that what really brings about that peaceful, generative state of grace is not this forceful effort, but it's opposite.
Calm clear, authentic, open-heartedness.
Calm and Clarity as our Natural State
The Buddha describes, when he gives meditation instruction for the first time to his monks, that serenity, peace, joy, rapture, and freedom from the suffering of the world, comes simply from making way for it. Not by reaching or grasping or working harder and better, but by learning how to let peace arise by settling our agitated minds. In other teachings, the mind/heart is described in its state of calm clarity, like a still, clear pool. When it's agitated, unable to see to the bottom for all the mud that's swirled up, or choppy, disrupted like a lake blown by strong winds, the only way to smooth it to its mirrorlike surface is to cultivate stillness.
Does, then, meditation make us complacent or complicit in the wrongs in the world?
As we learn about the paralyzing and depleting qualities of unbuffered stress and the way the mind works; as we consider mirror neurons and how each of us influences the next; as we've explored what health and wellbeing are made of...
It follows logically that we need practices to make us sane and balanced in order to better bring sanity and balance to a wounded world.
Our best contributions come from this calm, clear place. This state allows us to be fierce and compassionate. It also may follow that the best way to bring sanity and balance to the world at large, is to start local.
Start small.
Start where we are.
Start with the next wisest thing.
The Right Contribution
Too often, we are in the midst of doing what is the most meaningful contribution within our means, but we despair about what is undone. It's like our to-do list to be good enough is never ending. To give from this place of misunderstanding is depleting. Those who could be skillful, seasoned contributors within organizations or within circles of care burn out too often when this art of generosity and skillful serving isn't honed early on. Many of us may know those friends or family members who show up in big ways for the first wave of a crisis but don't have the stamina to be there for the weeks or months that follow. The disability or illness of a caregiver is the most likely reason that someone will need to be moved from care at home into assisted living. It's the unbuffered stress of caregiving that increases the likelihood of these injuries or stress-related illnesses.
Social workers, teachers, and often, primary caregivers, and those of us working to protect the environment, to undo systemic problems like racism, sexism, ableism, homelessness, take on challenges that by nature, are needs that will not get significantly smaller, no matter how much personal effort we give to them. We can easily be haunted by the dozens, hundreds, thousands who we are not serving, by the needs for comfort and ease that we can’t address, by the systems that seem unmoved by our efforts… at the expense of giving full presence to the one who sits with us in this moment.
When those who are needed in the world can serve without attachment to outcome, bringing this clarity and calm that gives rise to compassionate action... there is net gain. It may feel small.
But step back and consider: if each of us did the same, what could be possible?
Whether we think about how we care for a friend in crisis, or a systemic challenge in our communities, small, consistent contributions may be more impactful, more meaningful, than one, big, often imbalanced, effort.
Start small.
Start where we are.
Start with the next wisest thing.
Business Development Specialist at Base Hands
1moKaren, thanks for sharing!