Compassion and Challenge: Twin Faces of Growth?
In 2014, I moved to the Philippines, where I lived for little over a year. That wasn't the first time I had lived out of my native Singapore, but it was the first time I had done so in a country with a language and culture so different from my own. I couldn't have anticipated how much of a shock it would be for me to leave all that was familiar and find myself in strange territory.
Someone explained to me then that what I was experiencing was a loss of power: the power I had had in my own country that came from being able to communicate in my own language, knowing how to get around, being plugged into networks of shared meaning, having a good job and the self-respect that came from it, the support of loved ones, etc. ...
For a while I wondered, as I tried to pick up the pieces, what was left of me when all of that had been stripped away. I knew in theory that I was deeply loved for who I was and not for what I could do... But it was a long time before I started to really understand that in my heart.
It was the children who really helped me. On the street where we lived there was a bunch of children from different families that hung out and played together there. Every time we walked by they would call to us and run up to take our hands for a blessing (as Filipino children do with their elders), and once a week we invited them into our house to play or learn something together.
The spontaneity and innocent affection of the children - and their obvious desire to be loved - moved something deep in me. In learning to love them in their various moods, I started learning to do that for myself too.
I moved away from the Philippines then for 2 years, returning again just a few months ago in December 2017. I was looking forward to meeting the children again, and indeed it was a joy to see them: bigger in size and talking and acting more grown-up, but still much the same with their own unique looks and personalities (and, however grown-up they looked, still not immune to tantrums and arguments!) I was struck by how they seemed different and yet the same.
Perhaps "different and yet the same" described me too. I had changed in much the same way as the children looked: a little more grown up I hope, but still recognisably myself with all my gifts and weaknesses.
I read a phrase recently in The Tablet* about personal growth that struck me. When we accompany people in their personal growth, it said, what we give “... is not simply the offer of compassion, but an invitation to a journey." I was struck by the juxtaposition of "compassion" and "invitation to a journey" (which can also be thought of as challenge). These two seemingly contrasting elements are surely both necessary for our growth, but so often in creative tension!
"Compassion" was something I didn't know how to offer to myself at the start of my journey, when I first arrived in the Philippines and was constantly impatient at my inability to do things and castigating myself for not being like everybody else. Thankfully those who accompanied me, in their own offer of compassion - in accepting me exactly as I was - taught me its value. "Go gently" is something the sisters often say. "If you are gentle with yourself, then you can be gentle with others." Now on my second landing, while I am still learning, I notice in myself a greater ability to do both.
Compassion is necessary, for it is only in being accepted as we are that gives us the courage to step forth. But step forth we must, for God also waits for us in the wilderness, in the spaces that lie beyond what is comfortable and familiar for us -- in our self-transcendence. We are being offered, at every moment, along with all of creation, both compassion for who we are, and an invitation to be challenged; to leave our comfort zones and journey into who we can become.
May we have the humility and courage to respond to both!
Food for thought:
How am I being asked to give “compassion” to myself or to others?
How am I being challenged to journey beyond?
*Nicholas Henshall, "The Power of Pastoral Care", The Tablet 18 November 2017
Someone explained to me then that what I was experiencing was a loss of power: the power I had had in my own country that came from being able to communicate in my own language, knowing how to get around, being plugged into networks of shared meaning, having a good job and the self-respect that came from it, the support of loved ones, etc. ...
For a while I wondered, as I tried to pick up the pieces, what was left of me when all of that had been stripped away. I knew in theory that I was deeply loved for who I was and not for what I could do... But it was a long time before I started to really understand that in my heart.
It was the children who really helped me. On the street where we lived there was a bunch of children from different families that hung out and played together there. Every time we walked by they would call to us and run up to take our hands for a blessing (as Filipino children do with their elders), and once a week we invited them into our house to play or learn something together.The spontaneity and innocent affection of the children - and their obvious desire to be loved - moved something deep in me. In learning to love them in their various moods, I started learning to do that for myself too.
I moved away from the Philippines then for 2 years, returning again just a few months ago in December 2017. I was looking forward to meeting the children again, and indeed it was a joy to see them: bigger in size and talking and acting more grown-up, but still much the same with their own unique looks and personalities (and, however grown-up they looked, still not immune to tantrums and arguments!) I was struck by how they seemed different and yet the same.
Perhaps "different and yet the same" described me too. I had changed in much the same way as the children looked: a little more grown up I hope, but still recognisably myself with all my gifts and weaknesses.
I read a phrase recently in The Tablet* about personal growth that struck me. When we accompany people in their personal growth, it said, what we give “... is not simply the offer of compassion, but an invitation to a journey." I was struck by the juxtaposition of "compassion" and "invitation to a journey" (which can also be thought of as challenge). These two seemingly contrasting elements are surely both necessary for our growth, but so often in creative tension!
"Compassion" was something I didn't know how to offer to myself at the start of my journey, when I first arrived in the Philippines and was constantly impatient at my inability to do things and castigating myself for not being like everybody else. Thankfully those who accompanied me, in their own offer of compassion - in accepting me exactly as I was - taught me its value. "Go gently" is something the sisters often say. "If you are gentle with yourself, then you can be gentle with others." Now on my second landing, while I am still learning, I notice in myself a greater ability to do both.
Compassion is necessary, for it is only in being accepted as we are that gives us the courage to step forth. But step forth we must, for God also waits for us in the wilderness, in the spaces that lie beyond what is comfortable and familiar for us -- in our self-transcendence. We are being offered, at every moment, along with all of creation, both compassion for who we are, and an invitation to be challenged; to leave our comfort zones and journey into who we can become.
May we have the humility and courage to respond to both!
Food for thought:
How am I being asked to give “compassion” to myself or to others?
How am I being challenged to journey beyond?
*Nicholas Henshall, "The Power of Pastoral Care", The Tablet 18 November 2017
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