As we go through our experiences in CancerLand most of us develop
more compassion for other people. It happens as we face fear, grief and also
some hard truths about our selves. It continues as we come to humbly grasp and
accept the concept of projection (yes, we dislike in others what we most do not
want to face in ourselves), and we also develop more compassion when we really,
deeply understand that bumper-sticker saying that is all over Facebook these
days: “Be Kind to Others—Everyone is Having a Hard Time.”
We all know that’s true and we all click “like” on Facebook
to indicate, “Yeah, I know.” But that doesn’t actually help much when a
co-worker is snippy or a clerk is mean or when a neighbor takes your
well-meaning comment and replies with something nasty, or when a friend
suddenly goes chilly on you.
Here is something that does help me build compassion. It
comes from that fabulous Jungian Clarissa Pinkola-Estes who wrote “Women Who
Run with the Wolves”. She wrote:
“We can come close to
reconstructing the wounds of childhood by closely inspecting what adults lose
their temper over.”
Isn’t that great? A brilliant, insightful observation and a one-sentence
tool for almost instant compassion.
But don’t miss this part: When I began using that sentence
to help me with others I started out by diagnosing people in a less than caring
way, “Oh that control freak must have had a lot of chaos in her childhood—poor
her.” Hmmm….well, that’s not quite the spirit, is it?
Instead consider that Pinkola-Estes brilliant sentence can
also –and best—be used for developing compassion for yourself. That variation might go like this: I can come close to
recognizing and accepting the wounds of my
childhood by closely noticing what I
lose my temper over.
Isn’t that better? And softer? And that is what let’s me
keep changing my life.
