132: What We Truly Owe Each Other, with Alham Saadat

In this first in an occasional series on what we owe each other after collective traumas, bioethicist Alham Saadat shares unique insights from her experiences as a refugee and her work in bioethics at the Broad Institute.

Alham offers insights into the obligations we have toward one another both during crisis and in everyday life. "What we owe to each other is at the core of my belief system," she reflects, challenging listeners to expand their understanding of human responsibility.

The conversation ventures into leadership accountability, the weaponization of resilience, and the courage required to acknowledge harm. She argues that institutional acknowledgment of wrongdoing is often the crucial first step that takes pressure and strain off a person who's experienced harm. And emphasizes that truly supporting others requires humility, deep listening, and recognition that there are few clear-cut answers in life's most important areas.

"It's short-sighted in assuming that being strong is somehow equated with being a good person," Alham observes, advocating instead for normalizing vulnerability both personally and professionally. This perspective offers a refreshing counterpoint to society's relentless pressure to demonstrate unwavering strength and fortitude.

Whether you're navigating personal trauma, leading an organization through crisis, or simply seeking to deepen your connection with fellow humans, this conversation offers practical wisdom for building what Alham describes as the muscle of empathy. Listen now and reconsider what we truly owe each other as we journey through life together.

Alham Saadat, M.S. was the Associate Director of Ethical, Legal, and Social Implications (ELSI) in Biomedical Research at the Broad Institute and the co-director of the Broad Bioethics Initiative, which fosters bioethical engagement within the Broad community. As a scientist, ethicist, and community leader, she strives to advance biomedical research and maximize its potential to improve patient outcomes, particularly for underserved communities.

You can learn more about Alham on LinkedIn.

Go to https://betterhelp.com/resilience or click Notes on Resilience during sign up for 10% off your first month of therapy with my sponsor BetterHelp.

Chapters

• 0:00 Rethinking Strength and Vulnerability
• 3:35 What We Owe After Crisis
• 6:43 Refugee Experience Shapes Ethical Framework
• 11:08 Leadership Responsibility During Trauma
• 15:25 Resilience vs Preventing Harm
• 19:20 Vulnerability as Strength and Hope
• 32:42 Ethics in Biomedical Research

Transcript

Alham Saadat: 1:15

It's short-sighted in assuming that being strong is somehow equated with being a good person, a good leader, a good caregiver, a good friend. I think there are times where each of us finds strength in certain situations and we harness that, but I think just as important, I think, is showing times where you are vulnerable.

Manya Chylinski: 1:44

Hello and welcome to Notes on Resilience. I'm your host, manya Chilinski. My guest today is Alham Saadat, and this is a first in our occasional series on what we owe each other. Alham is the Associate Director of Ethical, legal and Social Implications in Research at the Broad Institute and is also the co-director of the Broad Bioethics Initiative. We talked about what we owe each other as human beings in general and what we owe each other after crisis. I think you're really going to enjoy this conversation, Alham. Welcome. I am so very excited that you and I are going to be having this conversation. Thank you for being here.

Alham Saadat: 2:29

Thanks so much, mani, I'm excited as well.

Manya Chylinski: 2:31

Before we dive into the topic, I like to ask my guests what is one thing you have done in any area of your life that you never thought you would do?

Alham Saadat: 2:43

Very interesting question and I immediately, when I was thinking through that, one, went to a place where.

Alham Saadat: 2:48

So I myself I'm a refugee from Afghanistan and over the last five or so years my husband and I have been involved in some refugee and asylum seeker resettlement efforts locally and one of the families that we worked with there was a mom who arrived to the US very pregnant.

Alham Saadat: 3:09

So when we met her she was about seven months along and she was very anxious about kind of giving birth in a hospital setting. All of her previous births had been in her home and then she kind of knew how to do that and didn't know what to expect in a hospital setting period, but let alone in a foreign hospital setting. So she was very anxious and I, after many conversations I, tried to convince her that a hospital setting was going to be the safest thing for her baby and that ended up going. She agreed, but what the negotiation that I made was that I would go with her for the when she went into labor and, unbeknownst to me, I, the day of, essentially became a doula for her. I was translating, I was, you know, helping her through the actual birth. Her husband just left the room conveniently for the last few hours, and so that was something that I never thought I would do, and it was a privilege and also a very surprising situation, because I really had not planned for it.

Manya Chylinski: 4:19

Right, wow, what an amazing experience and how wonderful that you could be there for her at a time that, I'm sure, is very anxiety producing for all of those reasons that you mentioned. Well, thank you for sharing that. So you and I today are talking about what we owe each other, and let's just get started with the big question so, after a collective crisis like a disaster or the pandemic, or organizational harm, what do you believe that we owe each other?

Alham Saadat: 4:55

Yeah, I think, first and foremost, it's acknowledging the trauma occurred and that people experience these things and those experiences likely manifest differently across different people and across slightly different environments and situations.

Alham Saadat: 5:12

But acknowledging it and really doing so deeply, I think is really important, because I think that's sometimes like that can be the first step of just like being able for the other person to be able to start processing is having people acknowledge that this, this harm occurred. So I think for me that is the first piece and then I think, the following very closely behind is just, you know, empathy. Empathy for persons, either within your community or outside your community, have gone through this experience, and being there for whatever they may need, whether it's just listening, listening to hear you know about what was particularly traumatic for them, being there physically for them, asking about what they might need in terms of resources and holding ourselves as fellow humans accountable to a certain extent, both kind of thinking about the social, emotional pieces, but also maybe some of the economic and logistical pieces and how can we navigate that in a way that is truly supportive for the folks that have come out of a really terrible situation.

Manya Chylinski: 6:21

Okay, I started with the let's jump in. There's been a crisis. What do we owe each other? Let's take a step back, and what do you think we owe each other generally?

Alham Saadat: 6:32

Yeah, I think we owe each other a lot generally. So I very much. My life viewpoint is one that we are all humans on this earth. There are some ties that bind us to kind of more of our immediate kind of networks and intimate relationships. But that for me, what we owe to each other quickly kind of moves beyond that and that responsibility of what we owe to our fellow humans I think for me is actually quite broad, both in kind of thinking about local geographies but also thinking about a global setting. Again, I think this very much comes from the fact that I myself am a refugee.

Alham Saadat: 7:11

Things happen in the world that no one has control over it's no one's fault. Things happen in the world that no one has control over it's no one's fault geopolitical and people are put in really really kind of tough situations without any decision-making power. And I think, having experienced that myself with my family, it very much helps me to see that potential, that inability to have control of your kind of life outcomes and things like that, and how important it was for us to have people feel like they owed us something. I think that type of I very much, from that experience, feel that I owe a lot to other people as a result of that. Yeah, and it, you know, for me it's. I think for some people it stems from a place of maybe like religion or spirit and maybe to a certain extent there is some spirituality for me involved. I'm not a very religious person, but I think that what we owe to each other is at the core of my belief system and should be at the core of any good spiritual or religious kind of guiding principles.

Manya Chylinski: 8:19

Wow, okay. Well, you mentioned specifically that things happen from decisions other people have made and it's something that happens to someone, whatever that might be, where that person doesn't have the ability to really make a choice about what's happened to them, and that makes me think about the leaders and the people who are making some of these decisions. What kind of responsibility do you think leaders have for the decisions that they make and for the human consequences that follow on those decisions?

Alham Saadat: 8:53

Yeah, I think, building off that key point about kind of experiences of trauma, in most cases, in almost all cases, the person isn't really in control of the situation.

Alham Saadat: 9:06

Something happens to them and I think, as leaders, a few things that you can do is just really again acknowledge that piece that you're helping somebody navigate a situation where they have not had control, where things feel very uneasy and uncomfortable, and having, you know, the humility to navigate that from a place again of empathy and trying to build understanding. So really the humility piece, like not going in to try to immediately solve it because you're not going to be able to do that right away. You may be able to do that later when you find out from the person themselves what they may need, but it's having the humility to be able to listen and increase your own understanding of the situation and have that inform kind of without jumping into solution and problem solving, have that inform kind of some more gradual next steps that are, you know, human centered, that are empathetic. Yeah, just really deep, the deep listening piece, I think, and doing so with humility, without trying to immediately go in and fix the situation that you may not fully understand Right.

Manya Chylinski: 10:17

And, as you're talking about, it feels to me like some of this is really hard work and I wonder if that's why sometimes it doesn't get done, because it is hard work.

Alham Saadat: 10:29

It's both hard and it requires time. So I think in our society we don't typically make a lot of time and space for these types of really important kind of healing processes. Deep listening it takes time, it takes effort, it takes emotional kind of strain from yourself to be able to listen to these really difficult stories and experiences. So I think it does ask a lot of people, both emotionally and, I would say, like logistically in terms of being able. In our busy society we again everyone's running from thing to thing. So I think slowing down intentionally, making space for deep listening, it's not easy, but I think it absolutely is kind of the core responsibility piece and and and, as you said, very, very hard to do Right.

Manya Chylinski: 11:29

Well, as we're thinking about taking that responsibility, so for a moment, let's think about an organization or an institution that maybe was part of creating the harm, or failed to prevent it, or was unable to prevent it in some way. What does it look like for an institution or an organization to take responsibility? What are some of the actions that would say to me as an outsider they get it.

Alham Saadat: 11:51

I think, first and foremost acknowledging that they caused harm. So the acknowledgement of their involvement in the harm that was caused in a situation I think is so, so critical that alone for many cases can feel just like take so much pressure and strain off of a person who's experienced the harm, so that the acknowledgement of their role in the harm I think is really, really important. And then anything. This is obviously situational, so it depends on the situation and the institution. But anything that the institution can do in that particular situation to two things kind of ensure that anything they can do to mitigate further harm or harm reduction that they can do in that situation. And then the second, I think just as important if not more important put systems in place to prevent future harm in a similar situation from happening again. So acknowledge that the harm happened and then find ways to kind of address the potential systemic ways that were involved in creating that harm and really work to change that so as to not repeat patterns.

Manya Chylinski: 13:02

Right, it's also something difficult. I feel like we keep hearing stories of harm that continues to get perpetuated and organizations that don't necessarily learn from their mistakes, and that acknowledgement piece, just as the core, that is something that is so important to me and in my own life I know the absence of it continues to be a challenge and yeah, I mean these are. So you spend a lot of time thinking about a lot of really complex actions and thoughts and behaviors.

Alham Saadat: 13:39

I do I do. I think over time I've kind of built some of these skills and intuitions across my own life and relationships that I've built I've also learned from harm that I've caused myself to others and really had that really the impact kind of the feeling of causing that harm really help inform changes in behavior, changes in the way that I approach things, changes in behavior, changes in the way that I approach things. So yeah, I think it's being in my late 40s. I think a lot of that type of learning happens in real life and I think my bioethics training has also kind of informed a lot of the ways that I think about these things.

Alham Saadat: 14:16

That in important things in life there's very few kind of clear cut answers of like this is always right, very few kind of clear-cut answers of like this is always right, this is always wrong. And I find that most important things, things that you really care about, are in the gray space. So how do you navigate that gray space and build some kind of moral intuitions on how to make adjustments that are appropriate, that are context-specific, that are person-specific, that are context specific, that are person specific, that are really thinking about the overall big picture of the situation? I think my bioethics training has definitely informed that and that weighing and balancing of ways of thinking about things, because in almost every situation there is, you know, some benefit to doing things a certain way and some negatives of doing it in a certain way. And so really just being thoughtful about that and really taking time to think about that full scope as you consider how to respond to a situation.

Manya Chylinski: 15:12

Right and I appreciate you saying that in very few situations is there one clear right or one clear wrong. And talking about those gray areas, I think, just benefit in recognizing, just as a human, that we live in those gray areas and it's okay to be confused and not know the right answer.

Alham Saadat: 15:36

Slightly related. People are different, right? So with all of us all humans, right? So yes, with all of us all humans. We're interesting, quirky, smart and very different from each other. I've seen this with my everyone I've met. I've seen it with my three children, who are incredibly different from each other. You learn to appreciate the beauty of that and also the messiness of that. And then that also, I think, adds complexity as you're making decisions in various contexts. It's like people are inherently different in some ways, and how do we make time and space to kind of take that into account as well?

Manya Chylinski: 16:13

Yes Again, and that takes work. I'm not saying work is a bad thing, I'm just noting can't sort of coast your way through these kinds of decisions and conversations. So I, even though this podcast is called Notes on Resilience, I have a problem with the word resilience and not what it means, more the way it gets talked about, and I feel like it gets weaponized, that we frame it as this personal trait and, no matter what happens to you, it's fine because you are resilient. But we then it feels to me sometimes we use that as an excuse not to address the underlying situation that is, putting someone in that situation where they have to survive. So not even sure I have a question there, I'm just curious what you think about that.

Alham Saadat: 17:06

Yeah, I completely agree, manja. I think resilience is a very complicated topic. I think there are differences in people's capacity to kind of deal with stressful and traumatic experiences. I think to a certain extent we're trying to understand that. But I think I agree with the really central point that you're making, which is that trying to focus on resilience as a solution for preventing trauma is not necessarily a healthy approach, that we should really be thinking about kind of harm prevention, trauma prevention, rather than focusing on how people do or do not respond well to it, right? So I think it takes the responsibility away from the person that's causing the harm and the trauma and puts a little bit of the kind of focus on how are people experiencing it and how are they resilient or not resilient in that context. So I agree with you on that.

Alham Saadat: 18:07

And resilience is complicated too, right? I think somebody who may have additional support systems, whether it's family or friends, may be able to access resilience in a different way. Financial, socioeconomic things, I think can affect resilience. So it's complicated and I tend to agree with you that having the focus beyond that, rather than trying to think about harm prevention and trauma prevention not that they're mutually exclusive, but sometimes the focus tends to be a little bit more on the resilience than I think and a little bit less on really trying to prevent harms sufficiently.

Manya Chylinski: 18:45

Right. So we have been talking about you know what we owe each other in terms of crisis or a trauma, and the thing about it is the impacts of the trauma can last for years, for your lifetime. I mean, I'm 12 years past my trauma and there are still things that come up that specifically have the potential and sometimes do re-traumatize me. But I'm curious like what do we owe people over time? Because it's hard for again. I talk about how difficult it is, but it's difficult to maintain a level of empathy for something that happened 12 years ago and so we should be offering support months and years later. But how do we deal with that? What do we owe people in the moment of the crisis and 10 years later?

Alham Saadat: 19:40

Yeah, I mean, I think we've talked about in the moment of the crisis some of the acute things that I think are really important, but thinking kind of longer term, I think this leads to this idea of like, I think, if we are thinking about how we operate in this world with fellow humans and what do we owe each other broadly, and using that lens to guide what do we owe each other broadly, and using that lens to guide what do we owe each other, what do we owe somebody who's experienced an acute trauma 10 years later? I think some of the same. I would think that the some of the same guidance would apply of having humility to to not make assumptions, that you know you, you know somebody's life experiences, or I would argue that for most people there has been some level of trauma that they've experienced. So this, this idea of just having that be built into the way that you kind of interact with people and show up in any type of settings, whether it's personal work, etc. With from a lens of empathy and kind of always like listening and seeking to better understand.

Alham Saadat: 20:47

So I think those types of things broadly are things that we can do for all of our fellow humans and especially for folks that have experienced acute traumas 10, 15, 20 years later is just again. Have humility to assume you don't know what that person went through or continues to go through. Have empathy to make time and space to kind of if there, if somebody is willing to kind of share that with you, to listen and participate in deep listening and use that to inform again that piece of like every situation is different, but have that inform how you interact with that fellow human going forward, yes.

Manya Chylinski: 21:30

And I think something you said is so important that everyone, or almost everyone, has gone through some thing, something difficult, some sort of trauma on some level. And having that humility and being open and doing that deep listening is important, because we don't know what everybody's going through and we don't have to know what everybody's going through Right and one, I believe one should not have to reveal your trauma in order to be treated fairly and with empathy and with compassion.

Alham Saadat: 22:31

Yeah, exactly, exactly. I think not making assumptions that because somebody is, for example, maybe in a leadership role, who's from a kind of a dominant group in society, is well off financially, making assumptions that that they haven't experienced a traumatic situation. It's just not making assumptions. And again, approaching relationships of any sort work or personal with a from a place of empathy and kind of seeking to build understanding and listening for when, when, when there are opportunities to learn, and kind of build an increased understanding.

Manya Chylinski: 23:07

And that's a the ability to do that is like a muscle that we build up right. So I think about my own journey and how I've become much more compassionate and empathetic since my own experience probably reasonably passionate before that. But I think about the differences and how I've grown in that and so I know that's something, again, we all may have a natural level of, but then through living in this world we develop more or less based on what's going on in our lives.

Alham Saadat: 23:43

Yeah, yeah, definitely, and I absolutely and I again I can speak for myself as I've gotten kind of older, I have definitely it's a muscle that's been built and been trained over time and, like I mentioned when I've done things not well have been really important learning experiences for me on how to do better the next time and also learning to be kind with myself. We're not human, we're all. We're all human. We're not perfect. We're going to make mistakes no one is perfect and and having grace with myself too, in those moments where I don't do things optimally, in the ways that we're saying, this is this is hard work, and then learn, but also learning from it and trying not to or trying to do better the next time. I think those those types of things for me have been really important Just taking a pause, having grace with myself during a difficult situation and then really learning from it and trying to do better.

Manya Chylinski: 24:44

That's something I work on as well, and we talk about this, that it is difficult work and it's ongoing. Even people who you would look at and, objectively, everyone would say this is a compassionate, empathetic person, that person's working on it too, and I think that's an important reminder. There's not this state of perfection one can attain.

Alham Saadat: 25:08

No, I think, yeah, I think that perfection is likely a goal that is not reachable by most and I think it's okay, Because I think we have the capacity to do a lot of good outside of perfection and I think focusing on that places where we can be empathetic kind help people when they're experiencing difficult, really difficult situations.

Manya Chylinski: 25:32

Yeah, so in our society in particular, we talk a lot about people being strong and we expect people to be strong and we accept them to keep, expect them to just keep pushing through, and that is often lauded as a good quality. I don't believe it necessarily is a good quality. There are certainly some things where it is important to keep pushing through. But I'm wondering, just from an ethical perspective is that a failure in imagination, a failure in the way that we're thinking?

Alham Saadat: 26:07

I think it I wouldn't say failure, but I think it's definitely short-sighted in assuming that being strong is somehow equated with being a good person, a good leader, a good caregiver, a good friend. I think there are times where each of us find strength in certain situations and we harness that. But I think just as important, I think, is showing times where you are vulnerable, where you are experiencing a difficult moment in your life or have had a difficult, specific experience, and sharing that with others and showing your humanity, rather than you know this. I think a lot of times, what is tends to be a superficial facade of like I am strong, I can get through a lot of things, therefore I am more successful, better at what I'm doing, etc. But and I think there is space for that but I think it's just as important to show when you're not kind of, in those strong moments when you are more, much more vulnerable.

Alham Saadat: 27:15

I try to do that with my kids, share with them the weeks that are particularly tough, so that they know that this is, it's normal, all the feelings that you experience. They're part of being human and you try to avoid having them overwhelm you, but they are a hundred percent part, a normal part of being human and you try to avoid having them overwhelm you, but they are 100% part, a normal part of being human and sharing that with them and normalizing that sharing, I think, for me is really important, and also doing so whenever appropriate in work settings as well. Normalizing the sharing of this. Has been a tough day or week. I could use some additional support or I could maybe if we could move this meeting or things like that. So I think being able to show that vulnerability and not hiding things and putting them under this bucket of you know I'm strong. Therefore I should not share any of this I think can humanize you and can I humanize everyone around you to be able to do the same thing, right?

Manya Chylinski: 28:18

I think people really do see the value when someone else allows themselves to be vulnerable. In my own experience I have. I've seen that. You know, early on, when I first started sharing my story, I didn't put my name to it. I was afraid of that vulnerability and at some point realized I'm perpetuating to me. For myself, I realized it's perpetuating stigma for me to be afraid to share my story and I don't judge anybody else who doesn't want to share their story but for me, I realized I have to let myself be vulnerable and you will not be surprised, nor will our listeners.

Manya Chylinski: 29:03

Many people said really awful things, but mostly I didn't hear most of those things and I didn't listen to the ones that I did hear, because I listened to the person, to the people who said thank you for saying what I'm afraid to say, or thank you for sharing your experience, because that's how I felt and I felt alone. Yeah, so we're getting close to the end of our time, so one wrap up question and use it to say anything I forgot to ask you that you wanted to say. But what is giving you hope right now?

Alham Saadat: 29:38

What's giving me hope is things that are happening in my kind of local, immediate network of humans so my family, my children in particular, giving me a lot of hope. I'm constantly amazed at how thoughtful and kind and empathetic they are and I think that's a beautiful thing and that gives me hope for the future, a future generation that is, you know. Thinking about these things, I think there's a lot of really great things happening people that are in really difficult situations that are happening on a national level, that are stepping up to do really important work to help their fellow humans and to kind of lift that thing of what we owe to each other. So I see that happening in various places in my local community. So those things are giving me hope right now. I think are particularly important to focus on in times like this when there's not a whole lot to be hopeful for in the immediate future.

Manya Chylinski: 30:38

Yes, thank you for that. And before I say goodbye, can you share with our listeners a little bit more about your work and what you do and how they can reach you?

Alham Saadat: 30:48

My name is Alham Sadaat. I work at the Broad Institute where, in my role, I think about the ethical, legal, social implications of biomedical research, so really thinking about how we can navigate and interact with questions and throughout the research process that can have real tangible impacts later on as they reach people, the kind of the outputs of our work, and so we provide, you know, some resources and ways for them to really ask some of these important questions even at early stages of biomedical research, with the idea that, as things move towards helping people and patients, that we have done everything in our power to help reduce harm, potential for harms and increase positive impact for as many people as possible.

Manya Chylinski: 31:39

Wow, thank you for sharing that and thank you for the work that you do and I've really enjoyed our conversation. And thanks to our listeners for listening to this episode of notes on resilience, and we will catch you next time.

Alham Saadat: 31:53

Thank you so much, Manya. That was a wonderful conversation.