I used to know this girl; petite and cheerful, of Asian descent. In particular, I remember one story about her: She was walking down the street one evening, happening to walk by some racist thugs. Totally unprovoked, they decided to have some fun with her, and began shouting out insults, spitting at her feet.
She ran home, straight into the arms of her brother, and cried her eyes out. He was a devout religious man, and after a few seconds of holding her, he told her that she should learn to forgive. Forgiveness was a virtue, he said. She should have learnt that by now.
She told me later that she stayed in his arms, simply because she had no one else to turn to. She said her brother’s words stabbed her like a knife – in addition to the injury she had suffered, she felt like a failure because her heart wasn’t big enough to forgive those men. But when her sister returned, she fled to her arms. The two were close; her sister silently held her tight and stroked her hair for hours until she stopped crying.
The value of understanding, the value of having been on the same path, is something that I’ve always placed importance on. How can someone who has been through the same pains say something like that? Those were the words of someone, perhaps with kind intentions, but who had not been in her shoes; in fact, could not put himself in her shoes.
And therein lies the insult. Was her brother being religious, spiritual, or compassionate? Wasn’t he advocating forgiveness, which is one of the greatest virtues we can have? Why did it hurt her, why did it feel like mockery?
To some readers, this might be an extreme example; to others, what he said would be mild. But how many of us have done the same? How much of our previous charity been a slap in the face?
Who can tolerate kindness like this? The people you help – they hold their tongue, they swallow their anger – for they need whatever you are offering. If they didn’t they might have shouted at you – who are you to come here with your smug advice, and your holier-than-thou attitude?
I don’t know much about history, about politics. And so I don’t know if this is my place to say this. But this is something that struck me: How many wars have been started, because of this very same attitude? Each nation trying to force their point of view upon the other, each nation thinking they know what is best for the other?
And this is another reason we should first find the peace within, to work on ourselves. When we find the peace within, when we have conquered our own demons – then a truly compassionate response will be possible.
Practiced compassion – it is something that many people espouse, many people call beautiful. And there is nothing wrong with it. Practice Loving-Kindness, and let your ego and selfishness slowly disappear. And one day, you’ll find that compassion comes from beyond you – you are merely the instrument.
But until that day, until you can Love so deeply that the doer and the doing melt into one – be very careful.
What is Compassion? What is Love? Love is simply the unconditional acceptance of the human being, just as they are. Love them for their pains, love them for their wounds and injuries, love them for their imperfections, love them for everything they do to make you angry.
In advocating forgiveness, her brother had simply ignored who she is. Forgiveness was on his mind, not her. A spiritual and religious concept had taken priority. A writer, I can’t remember who, said it perfectly: He had pushed away the human in front of him, for the ideal – a mere concept! He was adding insult to injury; he was ignoring her emotional state, the way she was at that exact moment in time.
Kindness, forgiveness, and having a big heart – that was important to him, but not his little sister. Or perhaps he was projecting his kindness towards the people who had hurt her. He was trying to force his world views onto her, subjecting her to a “should”, one of the tyrannies of the human race. Forgiveness is a virtue, yes – but perhaps there is a time and a place when one should bring it up.
Am I condemning her brother? No, for his intentions were kind. But he lacked that understanding, he hadn’t climbed the mountain within.
And so the confusion and resentment is there. If she stays, then it is because she needs the material help – she needs the hugs and love, so she grits her teeth and listens to his sermons.
How many of our charitable acts are like this? I have met many volunteer workers; they spent their spare time in foreign countries, freely using their skills to help and heal as many as they can. Many of these are the most gentle souls I have ever met; but many more also had a smugness in them. Were they creating the same insult, the same resentment? Were the people they were helping swallowing their pride, simply because they needed the food and the medical help?
And this is always the hardest to admit. That I had been in her brother’s shoes before, and perhaps I still am. That so much of my previous kindness had the same unintended insult to it. It is easy to say someone else has not Loved. It is easy to say other men and women have done the wrong thing, put out an insult with their kindness. But can we turn that to ourselves? It hurts, it’s a stunning realization to say that we – we – have never been kind, never been truly compassionate?
This is the other side of the same coin – in demeaning others, we are demeaning ourselves. We are boosting our own ego, for the joy of advising others is a very subtle function of the ego. How many times has this happened? Someone comes to you for comfort, crying, looking for a shoulder to cry on. You comfort them, and then you tell them what they should do.
And hidden in that advice, almost always, is the ego. It is almost impossible not to find superiority when we open our mouths to give advice. I’ve been trying something new. Whenever someone comes to me in sorrow, I begin to comfort them as I normally do. But the moment I open my mouth to speak – I check for the ego, I make absolutely sure that there is no superiority hidden within. And then, there was nothing I could say. All I could do was to remain silent.
If I had spoken, though, it would have been a certain smugness disguised as warmth – see, if you have done it my way, if you had been more like me – this wouldn’t have happened to you.
Be very alert, and then you can see this in almost everything. In Part One of this series, I mentioned an argument I had with someone I had to work with. She had a sharp and venomous tongue, and she applied it liberally. I felt my anger arise, but I calmed myself down and responded to her in a very calm and polite manner.
But wasn’t this the same? Forced calmness, forced politeness – it is no different, it was just pride in disguise. She was childish, argumentative, and immature. I was the grown man, and I certainly showed her how to handle business like an adult. How egotistical! In retrospect, I was just as childish and immature as she was. Whatever I judged others to be, so was I.
“What about your website? Aren’t you giving out advice?” you might ask. Yes, perhaps. I’ve always seen my website as a journal of my own growth, and I have stated many times that I am not a guru, nor an enlightened master. Everything here is my opinion, not the absolute truth. The moment I become a master, my readers have become ignorant. They are no longer fellow travelers, they’ve become something less, and that is something that I will never see my readers as.
But still, you might be right. This is another painful thing to admit, but there have been many times I have read my older posts, and shuddered to find shades of pride and stubbornness.
But what do we do? If we take the ego out of our responses, and we have nothing to say – what then?
Perhaps what her sister did was the right thing. She was there as a compassionate presence, she was present as a pillar of silent support.
She didn’t react or feed her pain. Any reactivity will strengthen their emotions, justify their sorrow. Even disagreeing or agreeing with her is a form of reactivity. In A New Earth
This might go against conventional social skills: if someone is complaining about something, don’t agree with them. Simply remain silent and let their sadness, their anger, run their course. It is true that if you agree with them, they might like you more, and that might be all you want. But in doing so, you’ve strengthened and confirmed their misery, their ego. You’re showing them that complaining works, or maybe you’re building dependency.
Listen, really listen to what they are saying. In our heads, we are always formulating responses to their comments, we are always projecting our own issues on to them. Cease all that, and really listen. Be in a state of pure presence, and let their pain run out of steam.
Give help in the form of energy, of love. Let them be authentically themselves; not someone else. Let them become fully human, allow them to accept their humanity and their sorrows. That will be more powerfully transformative than any advice you can give. You might well know – how many of them will actually listen to what you have to say? How many of them will take your counsel and act upon them?
Naturally, this is not to say: Never help them. When you remove the ego, there is still very often an action or piece of advice you can give.
Find Love within yourself, and create a climate of Love and compassion around yourself. And then your mere presence will bring about healing.
I recently participated in a group writing project. We had to write a blog post in a list format, and then submit it for voting. The winner gets a nice little prize. Out of the 67 participants, we had to pick 3 of our favourites, and post them here, each one counting as a vote.
I entered my recent blogging tips and rant post. And to be honest, I still don’t know why it was so popular amongst my readers.
But anyway, here are my favorite three out of the master list:
The first, 35 Ways to increase your RSS subscribers, is a great list of marketing tips that will be a good read for many new bloggers.
The second, 8 Habits of Highly Successful Salespeople, is a nice list of things that everyone should read. Especially the first tip in the list: Being sold on yourself. If you have complete confidence that your product (or you, if you are selling a service or skill) is the best, that is half the battle already. Useful for everyone, including bloggers!
The last one I liked, simply because it gave me a good chuckle. I don’t know if female readers will find it offensive though, it reminds me of those emails that get passed around: Why blogs are a female gender.
So there you go, my three votes. Now go and threaten Luciano with bombs and molestation if he doesn’t award me first prize. 
Here are all the participants of the group writing project, just to spread the link love a little.
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I am very glad that you liked my article on 35 Ways to increase your RSS subscribers. I hope that your readers enjoy it and use it to increase their subscribers.
Hey Fred, thanks for the comment and the great list. Good luck for the project, wonder who’s gonna win it?
What a touching article. When you see someone in emotional pain, you want to try and help. The advice you give may be smug but it is also subconscious way to try and “make it better”, to ease the misery if you will. Sometimes we don’t know what to say, we just don’t want to see those we care about suffer.
I also took part in the Litemind Group Writing Project. Good luck to you and thank you for the link.
When I’m with other people I tend to be a good listener and try not to give advice unless someone asks for suggestions. That’s why I started my two blogs, so I get to express my opinion, too.
Instead of giving other people advice I try to ask myself, “Where are you doing this in your own life, Jean?” That’s an incredibly powerful question. It keeps me busy enough that I don’t have time to pretend I’m an expert on other people’s lives.
Some times when giving advice, timing is important. Forgiveness is a noble virtue. But, something best practised yourself, rather than trying to convert other people.
@ Neena: Thank you! Yes, sometimes we just want to ease the pain but could end up making it worse.
@ Jean: Jean that’s a brilliant self-inquiry! I’m finding that the shadow side of ourselves often shows through when we react to others, and therefore it’s a good pointer to find out where our shadow lies. I’ll have to try that now
@ Tejvan: I agree with you on both points, timing and forgiveness from yourself
Thanks for stopping by.
Albert, excellent writing! And I guess as authors of “self improvement blogs” per say, we tend to be guilty of passing off our judgment at times, if not often on our own articles. I certainly find myself doing so too at times.
But on a rather objective note, life isn’t all about empathy. I’d love to have a crying shoulder when I’m sad, frustrated but after the fact, having someone who would help me see a situation (be it forgiveness or whatever) from a different light is something I truly value from the experience. I can’t change the fact that incident has happened. But I can certainly the way I see it.
Pain is inevitable, but suffering is optional. If I’m able to derive an awakening from the whole saga, it certainly makes the pain worthwhile. At least that’s for me.
Oops, I hope I’m not being too judgmental here
Cheers,
Ellesse
Heya Ellesse,
Thanks! It’s very hard not to pass judgement, agreed. So I have to use my personal stories a lot, so if I’m judging someone at least it’s myself, heh.
Love that quote – Pain is inevitable, but suffering is optional. I believe once we accept suffering, we grow from it.
Thanks for stopping by!
Ellesse brings up a good point. My problem isn’t finding someone to help me see things in a new light, it’s how long to be a sympathetic shoulder to cry on. That’s the trouble with being a good listener, some people are happy to use you, but they have no interest in making changes in their lives. I’m not trying to change other people…on some level their strategy is working for them. The question is how much time I’m willing to spend being involved when the same basic situation comes up again and again.
On the other hand, I once spent several hours a week listening to a woman who was going through a transition. It was at least two or three times a week for a minimum of two hours a time. She didn’t want advice…she didn’t even want me to say anything. She just wanted to talk. It went on for quite a while, and I gently ended it when it was clear she had moved on to a new life and I was having some scary health problems which meant giving myself some tender loving care.
I sometimes asked myself why I did it. It was understandably boring at times, but the woman wasn’t looking for sympathy, she was thinking and processing information. And whenever I see her now she gives me a big smile…she’s clearly happy with her life. I’m not sure I would do that again with someone else, but I’m glad I made a difference in her life.
Blogging certainly is a lot more fun!
My attitude towards my own problems is similar to Ellesse…I figure if I have to go through the pain I might as well get something out of it. No sense wasting experience.
Hey Jean! I know how you feel, and to be honest I don’t know the answer to that too. In fact, I was planning (at the end of this series), to open the comments to the readers. How would they respond / how would they prefer others to respond?
All I know is that actions and words from the ego never works out well. It might hurt them, or at best, they just don’t listen. Sometimes when you take the ego out, there will still be a compassionate word or action you can take.
But just like you said – what if they just keep coming back at you? The only thing I can think of is – you can lead the horse to water, but you can’t make it drink. Hence, the importance of your own journey – once someone sees that you’ve got it all under control, they’ll want to know how you did it. And then they’ll be more willing to listen. So let them come to you, instead of pushing it on to them.
What do you think?
Thanks for sharing your stories, I am really enjoying these conversations with my readers.
Jean, wow I must say you’re a great friend! I’ll love to have a friend like you
Yes, I agree that you shouldn’t change a person. But you can inspire her.
And I think you probably did. I don’t know what you did or what you said. Or It could your patience. It could be your kindness. But whatever little you think you’ve done, you’ve already triggered a soft spot in her or at least provided a avenue for her to reflect, lessen her pain and just move on.
By doing that, you’re actually leading her to the water — using Albert’s analogy per say — yes, I agree you can’t force the horse to drink it. But when the horse is really thirsty, it’ll know where to get the water.
Knowing where to get it is already half the job done.
Cheers,
Ellesse
Albert, this was a very thought-provoking and challenging article! I have to confess that my whole professional life centers on giving advice! I’m a teacher, which tends to involve lots of advice-giving. I guess, though, that when one selects a teacher, there is openness and willingness to receive advice. I certainly want advice from my own teacher. So maybe there is a difference between offering our advice to friends and those who come to us for comfort, and giving advice to those who come to us for that specific purpose?
As for giving advice in my capacity as a psychic – well, I try to keep myself out of the picture as much as possible, and let my client’s Guides and Higher Self give the guidance.
Within all of this, it would be easy to get caught up in ego. I try to see all my students and clients as my teachers. I do enjoy being really good at what I do – is that ego, or just taking ownership of our strengths? It’s a fine, fine line, I think. Because in our desire to come from spirit rather than ego, we can also downplay what we have to add. Avoidance of ego can be ego, too, don’t you think? “Look at how humble I am, I am not governed by my ego.”
At least my blog posts pretty much reflect whatever I’m working on personally, so I just share that publicly. So I’m not counting that as advice
Thanks for the inspiration!
Blessings,
Andrea
I couldn’t agree more about the listening part. I’m getting ready to go into a meeting for eight hours with a man I don’t particularly like. I’ve learned lately that if I actually listen to him and stop projecting my views of him on him, I can find things to enjoy about him. When I am present with him, all is well.
Thanks for your eloquence and insight, as always.
Andrea, loving your feedback and insight, it really gives new perspective and a lot of food for thought.
Definitely…I agree with you there. I didn’t think to put that part in, dumb old me! In the comments above, I was wondering about the saying “you can lead the horse to water, but you can’t make it drink.” I guess all we can do is just to find our own path, and once others see it in us, they’ll come to us naturally. You’re doing this fantastically, as far as I can see
Yes, a good friend pointed the “ego pretending not to be the ego” thing in me a few months back. He had realised that my ego was still there, pretending not to be there. Some teachers call it the enlightened ego. Very tricky stuff.
Blessings in return!
Laura, thank you for the comment, and for affirming what I’m saying. I’ve heard what you describe as truly being in the Now – not seeing them through the filters of your old memories, but as he is in the present. It really makes a difference, doesn’t it?
Albert,
This is a thought provoking and well thought-out article.
I think you would enjoy the writings of Venerable Thanissaro Bikkhu,(Geoffrey deGraff), the American abbot of a traditional Thai Buddhist monastery – Metta Forest Monastery in California . He is one of the world’s most authoritative writers on the Theravada and Thai Forest traditions. In addition to scriptural commentaries and translations, he has done some excellent satires of modern interpretations of Buddhism in America, which he calls “designer Buddhism.”
On place you can find his writings is on accesstoinsight.org at:
http://www.accesstoinsight.org.....index.html
Thanks for the link!
To meet his own agenda, the brother forgot the most important thing—to be compassionate with his sister. That would have been his best way to teach his message about compassion.
I am a good listener so people have always come to me for advise and for years I freely gave it. It made my ego feel really good and superior to those who asked for my input.
Today, I share from my own experiences and lessons. Ego does not get the free reign that he once did. Judgments still occasionally sneak in. When they do, I search out the reasons and find out what I am still judging in myself. Every judgment that I make is about me. My ego is a great teacher pointing out to me the areas that I still need to work on.
Thanks for the great article.
I’ve always pretty much bobbed my poor ego over the head when it became too needy. By now I’ve lightened up considerably about the whole matter. My two criteria to see if I’m on the right track are: (1) Do I have a sense of humor, or am I taking myself too seriously? (2) Am I trying to control other people…am I assuming I know what’s best for them? I used to want to touch people’s hearts and change their lives, but that sounded way too presumptuous. Now my motto is “Find what you love to do and find a way to share it with others.” The results may very well be the same, but the second approach is much more light-hearted and fun. If someone else benefits from what I do that’s great, but it’s not my problem. My job is simply to play my part well, let go of the results, and have a good time doing it.
In my blogs I’m aiming to share what works for me and ask others what works for them. The blogs are about sharing, not pontificating. I might not always succeed, but it’s not a big deal either way.
Oops! That should have been bopped, not bobbed!
@ ReddyK: Thanks for stopping by, and nice link. Very advanced stuff, some of it went way over my head, heh.
@ Karthik: You’re welcome!
@ Patricia: Thanks for coming by again, Patricia. Love your personal stories and perspectives, as always.
Jean, the second question you ask yourself – am I trying to control them – is a great question. It’s part of my next post, and I’m trying to figure out how to express my thoughts on it. I think you’ve helped a lot. Thanks for your insights.
Wow, Albert, that was an extremely deep article. I really liked it, and it made me re-think some of how I behave.
Advice seems to be getting a bad rap in the comments on this article. I don’t think there’s anything wrong with giving advice, as long as you give it when they seek it, rather than trying to force it upon them.
Also, one other thing from the comments… Ellesse said you shouldn’t change a person, but the reality is that you can’t change a person. You are who you choose to be, not who someone else chooses for you to be. You can try to manipulate them into changing, but they are still choosing to make that change, it’s not you changing them.
Hey Jason, good to see you are spending lots of time here, I’m very grateful for your participation. Regarding advice, I do believe there’s nothing wrong with it, if we watch out for all the things I’ve been talking about in the articles. It’s very common (for me, at least), to fall into the ego/pride/holier-than-thou trap, when giving out advice.
Hey Jason, thanks for your clarification! Yes, you’re right. Precisely because of the fact we can’t change a person, we shouldn’t even contemplate it. You can clarify your stand on certain issues but it’s really up to the person if he wants to implement.
Albert, as bloggers, we tend to ignore the impact of our “advice” on our readers. But then again, constantly watching out for what we say can be a chore, isn’t it? I was just reading Skellie’s blog when she talks about audacious blogging and personally I think this boldness can be applied to advice and way of speech.
If you really feel that way, voice it out in a manner you deem to be most appropriate in the situation. But don’t restraint yourself just because you think it’s not going to be popular or even accepted by the other party. More often than not, useful advice isn’t most soothing to the ears.
In any case, readers have an option to unsubscribe if they cannot attest to what the blogger has to say. Who knows? The reader could have been attracted to subscribe precisely because of that no-nonsense approach.
And seriously, if you look around, the “more popular” bloggers (John Chow, Steve Pavlina) are those who practice audacious blogging, standing by what they think. Albeit raising a bit of controversy.
Cheers,
Ellesse
Hey Ellesse, yes you’re right it can be quite stressful, especially when you’re dealing with things like emotions and so on. Audacious blogging for things like Compassion is fine, but some advice, I’d rather stay out of that zone
Even the best written articles can be misinterpreted, as I’ve discovered. Some points I’ve hammered into my posts, and still get misunderstood. Case in point, my Loneliness – Beginning of Romance article. If you could read some of the other blogger’s reactions to it… woo!
Cheers, Albert
It’s difficult when someone is in pain… and you understand the internal shift that can release that pain… not to say anything.
But often the person doesn’t want to shift the pain, or doesn’t comprehend how they can. What they want is comfort and agreement and compassion and holding.
Yet what they need is to shift.
How does one who knows make this discernment between giving someone what they want – and thereby keeping them internally the same… and giving someone what they need – and risking hurting them more?
Forgiveness isn’t necessarily a conscious action, but a spontaneous understanding that comes about through being in a place where other people’s action do not disturb the Self within.
To make an effort to forgive is not to forgive at all.
Smiles,
KL
Good stuff KL…I think I spread out my message too far across my blog posts, hence there is some misunderstanding. I think we should firstly take our ego out of our response, and then simply help them do whatever they want to do.
If they want to shift, then help them shift. If they want to stay (even though it will hurt them), then just provide support. I believe forcing our ideas on them and how they should live is a bit of a danger – how many religious wars were started because both sides thought this way?
For instance, if they were in an abusive relationship, we would say let’s get them out! But I’ve tried that before with a friend of mine, and she refused to leave her boyfriend, who was slapping her around. After a few months, she left of her own accord.
So based on this and many other experiences, they only do what they want to do. We can egolessly tell them that it’s best to leave, and then provide as much as support as we can, for whatever choice they make.
Brilliant discussion KL, awesome to have you here again.
Your story-telling is always so engaging. I look forward to exploring more posts. The ideas you raise about “false kindness” remind me of other struggles people may have concerning their ego. During visualisation exercises, people are taught to imagine what they desire to experience in order to bring that about faster. Sometimes these same people feel that they are lying to themselves, (i.e. saying things like, “money comes easily and frequently” or, “I love and forgive everyone”) when their inner voice (ego) tells them reality is different. Perhaps a sense of lying to oneself or feeling like someone doesn’t deserve our forgiveness is a valuable lesson. To me, this may be an early step in overcoming the influence ego may evolve to hold over us.
Thank you Liara! I see you’re spending heaps of time here, thank you!
I know what you mean with the inner voice – I experience the same thing (feeling like I’m lying to myself), and therefore I decided to tackle the inner voice straight on (as per the emotional mastery series) instead of trying to cover it up with positive affirmations and visualizations.
I’m not saying those are bad, but they come only after a certain stage, sort of like how you have to clean your walls before you repaint your house, otherwise your dirt will be trapped permanently there. Or something like that
What a penetrating insightful article – I am currently training to volunteer on the local crisis line and offerring emotional support (as opposed to offerring resources to help) seems to be one of the harder things to do. I often find myself at a loss for words when rather than discussing facts, I’m dealing with a person’s emotion over an extended duration – This article tells me that simply being a listening presence is perhaps adequate for the caller to feel supported….
Thank you Dorothy. I wonder if being a listening presence will help over the phone…maybe they’ll think you’ve fallen asleep heh!
in demeaning others, we are demeaning ourselves.
Very true.
By the way, I am stopping by from the Soup to Nuts Progressive Dinner.
Stop by the first course and visit me.
Thanks Sara, I’ll go over right now!
I think the only thing I do now is just avoid false conversations, false pretenses and those who don’t really want to be true. It’s just discouraging sometimes.
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