The Bigger the Space, the Easier it is to Care

I care, and then I turn away.
I get busy, or I lose interest,
or the crisis stops affecting me directly or never did, 
and I let my attention slip away.

I’m being honest, but I’m not glad about it,
because what I really want is to keep my heart open,
and keep my attention focused on whoever I can support.

Not by losing myself or getting overwhelmed
or letting my own wellbeing slip,
but by creating enough space in my heart and mind to remember 
that caring for others and caring for myself
are not different, not separate.

Transcript

Hi everyone, it’s Judi Cohen and this is Wake Up Call 474. I’m still following the fires in LA, where it seems like people are deeply shaken. They’ve been on alert for so long. It’s a long time to be on alert, anticipating disaster…if they haven’t already experienced it.

And I’ve also been noticing how, on my WhatsApp streams and text streams where there’s a bigger group but just one or two people who are directly affected, how quickly those who aren’t affected have moved on. 

Which seems natural to me, in the sense that there’s so much happening all the time, so much to be concerned with, so much impact all around. 

And, it makes me think of Quan Yin with her thousand hands and eyes, hearing the cries of the world and knowing how to respond with compassion for all. If she didn’t have so many open senses – open hands, open eyes – she wouldn’t be able to hear the cries, or respond with compassion.

I feel like it’s what’s asked of us, as mindfulness practitioners: to follow in the footsteps, or follow the example, of Quan Yin, and stay open, so we can hear the cries of the world. To not shut down or turn away or run away, and instead to listen and care. Which is also what’s asked of us as lawyers, too, isn’t it? To be open to, to hear, to respond compassionately to, our clients’ cries, which are also the cries of the world?

But in my experience, it’s not always easy to do that. I’m guilty of shutting down, turning away, running away. I tolerate so much and then I do those things. I do them in the name of self-care, putting on my own oxygen mask first, all of that, but I have questions. It’s like I’m coming around full swing, from overextending (and overwhelming) myself, to being boundaried, to wondering if boundaried is what’s best, or right, or wise, right now.

For sure it doesn’t feel wise to not take care of myself, or for anyone else to not take care of themselves. Very good care, because…this world, right? The fires. The confirmation hearings. The threats. The inauguration on Monday. That’s just January’s list. So yes to taking good care of ourselves. Did anyone see the wellbeing article in the New York Times on Tuesday? There were some suggestions I’d never heard before like to eat more dark chocolate covered nuts because they’re “almost the perfect food,” and to make the first step of a seemingly impossible task, smaller. I’ll put the link in the chat at the end of the Wake Up Call today in case you’re interested. 

But then the question I’m really curious about is, how is that different from taking care of others?

I’m thinking of LA, but it might be anywhere – take your pick. In a crisis, taking care of others – in our neighborhood or firm or school – actually feels to me like taking care of myself. Because whatever it is that we’re taking care around, we’re all in this together. 

So I’m thinking of this as “collective self-care,” which is a phrase that popped into my mind and that I looked up because I figured it had also popped elsewhere. And it had, or at least the phrase “collective care” is being used in Europe among youth activists. And then HUD, the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, put out a piece called Radical Self and Collective Care, for those building coalitions to support the unhoused. It’s a powerful piece that points to the legitimacy, first, of taking care of ourselves and of communities caring for one another, and then of the need. And it includes a number of mindfulness-based resources. Collective self-care.

Or maybe not differentiating between taking care of others and taking care of ourselves is even a form of collective liberation. Isn’t that the path of compassion that Zen and the Tibetan teachings point us towards? Is Quan Yin being lifted up and illuminated and liberated by the compassion she offers to others? 

Last week I was listening to the Mind & Life podcast (a great podcast). Mind & Life is an organization that the Dalai Lama co-founded and which explores the science of mind, and the podcast is hosted by Wendy Hasenkamp, who’s amazing. Wendy was interviewing Jim Coan, a psychologist and affective neuroscientist, on the topic of, “Our Social Baseline.” Among the things that stayed with me was Jim essentially confirming that collective self-care is a thing. He said that in a disaster, contrary to the Lord of the Flies scenario depicted in pretty much every disaster film, we don’t end up with everyone in their camp, fighting to the death for resources. We come together. We’re there for one another. We do what’s needed. We care, we help, and in doing that, we also get what we need and feel better ourselves, and feel better about ourselves. 

But then there’s the question of how? Or how to, what, overcome?, that tendency to just move on. We come together and care, but then when it’s not really about us, we turn away. So, is there a way to not turn away, or not turn away so much? Not “not turn away” and instead, stay and get overwhelmed, but “not turn away” and feel good? Or better than good: feel better for not turning away, and when not turning away?

In Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind, and Suzuki Roshi  says, “To give your sheep or cow a large, spacious meadow is the way to control them…. Suppose you are sitting under some extraordinary circumstances. If you try to calm your mind you will be unable to sit, and if you try not to be disturbed, your effort will not be the right effort. The only effort that will help you is to count your breathing, or to concentrate on your inhaling and exhaling[, and] see things as they are, and…let everything go as it goes.” I think he’s saying, make space. Because the bigger the meadow or space, the more we can see things are they are and let go. And I think underneath that he’s saying, it’s only by creating spaciousness that we can be with extraordinary circumstances, whether in the mind or in the world. 

So maybe to be able to hear the cries of the world (including our own), we need to create enough openness in the mind and heart, enough spaciousness, that everything fits, coming and going as it does, exactly as it is. And in that boundless space, it’s possible to stay with whatever is happening, or everything that’s happening. To “pick up one body at a time,” as Mother Teresa said. 

So that’s what I’m trying to do right now: create space, so that I don’t feel like I need to turn away from the cries of the world or from my own cries and can help, whatever is happening now, or next.