Journal of Sacred Work

Days 244-246 - Slaying Our Dragons

"Fairy tales don't tell children that dragons exist. Children already know that. Fairy tales tell children that dragons can be killed." -G.K. Chesterton.

   Dragons lived beneath my childhood bed. After the lights were turned out, they prowled the darkness, I kept my toy gun nearby ready to blast away if any of them attacked.

   Of course, I knew that dragons weren't "real." But, it's funny what demons arise when we lie in the darkness.

  When I was about seven, my father showed me a book that included the painting (at left) by Gustav Moreau. It was reassuring for me to know that dragons could be killed by skilled knights like Saint George.  

   Every patient comes to the hospital with some kind of dragon inside. We already know that. What patients hope is that their caregivers will be as skilled and courageous as Saint George - that they will slay the attacking dragon.  

   What may be less obvious is that every caregiver walks about with her or his own tribe of dragons inside. For dragons are nothing more than symbols of our fear.

   Fright concentrates our energy on the negative. Love focuses our energy on God.

   The most threatening demon for most caregivers is the one that scares us about mistakes. Ironically, the more we fear mistakes, the more likely they are to happen. The reason to treat patients well must be grounded in our passion to heal, not our fear or error.  

   We all need to travel through our work with the confidence of true knights. The gallant among us know they don't need to slay every demon. Sometimes the dragon will kill instead of being killed. The wisest knights know no fear because they recognize they are only called to do their best, not to be perfect.

   God's endless energy enables us to live Love, not fear. It is Love that weakens the power of every dragon, not the sword. 

   It is good to know that dragons can be killed. It is gratifying that so many illnesses can be cured. It is better to know that true healing comes only through God's Love.

-Rev. Erie Chapman

Days 242-243 Mother Teresa: Do It Anyway

The following poem is engraved on the wall of Mother Teresa's home for children in Calcutta. Apparently, it is a version of an earlier  writing called  "Paradoxical Commandments" by Dr. Kent Keith. Mother Teresa liked it enough to post it on the wall and others assumed that she authored it. I guess that is because we all know it is how she lived.

In actuality, Keith first wrote this remarkable poem when he was 19 and a sophomore at Harvard. Now speed forward to 1997, Keith was listening to a reflection at the beginning of a Rotary Club meeting. Mother Teresa had recently died and a member wanted to honor her memory. Keith was astonished to hear the words he had written in his youth. When Keith asked his friend where he found the poem, he recalled that it was in some book about Mother Teresa's life. That night Keith went to a bookstore and began searching until he discovered the poem on the last page of "Mother Teresa: A Simple Path." The book did not credit an author, only mentioned that it was posted at her orphanage.

Keith shares this story in his book, "Do It Anyway: The Handbook for Finding Personal Meaning and Happiness in a Crazy World." He was elated to learn that his words were meaningful to Mother Teresa,"I wanted to laugh, and cry, and shout–and I was getting chills up and down my spine. Perhaps it hit me hard because I had a lot of respect for Mother Teresa, and perhaps because I knew something about children's homes. Whatever the reason, it had a huge impact on me".

What fascinates me is the intimate connections our lives forge with one another. Like Keith, some people we may never meet, others only briefly but they profoundly touch our lives in ways that we could never have imagined. That is the miracle and power of Love. It is without limit or boundary and expansive in infinite ways. I get chills when it think about it.

Perhaps you are familiar with Keith's poem, which was renamed "Anyway." These are words that I needed to hear today. Especially when it comes to living in my skin...lessons I can apply not only to my relationship with others but with myself as well...as in, I am often unreasonable, illogical and self centered...and I forgive myself anyway.

~liz Sorensen Wessel

Anyway

People are often unreasonable, illogical and self centered;
Forgive them anyway.

If you are kind, people may accuse you of selfish, ulterior motives;
Be kind anyway.

If you are successful, you will win some false friends and some true enemies;
Succeed anyway.

If you are honest and frank, people may cheat you;
Be honest and frank anyway.

What you spend years building, someone could destroy overnight;
Build anyway.

If you find serenity and happiness, they may be jealous;
Be happy anyway.

The good you do today, people will often forget tomorrow;
Do good anyway.

Give the world the best you have, and it may never be enough;
Give the world the best you've got anyway.

You see, in the final analysis, it is between you and your God;
It was never between you and them anyway.

By -Dr. Kent Keith

August 26 - 1st International Caregiver's Day - Mother Theresa's 100th Birthday

 
   Although the actual date of her arrival in this world is in dispute, most authorities accept August 26, 1910 as the day Mother Theresa's was born. The precise moment doesn't matter much. What counts is that Mother Theresa was one of the finest examples of Radical Loving Care the world has ever known.

   There is no "International Caregiver's Day" - no date on the calendar when the country or the world celebrate the invaluable and endless Love that flows to us through the hearts of caregivers. Let's make THIS the day.

   Henceforth, note August 26 on your calendar as a special day to pause and reflect on your fellow caregivers. Mark today as the first, International Caregiver's Day. 

   In honor of the occasion, Liz Wessel has created three beautiful watercolors. They are displayed here as part of our celebration.

   We need to celebrate the sacrifices of caregivers everyday, of course. But, special dates enable a high focus on what is taken for granted on most other days.

   Unfortunately, I don't have the power to give you the day off. But, you have the power to give yourself at least a few minutes today to celebrate the work of you and your friends - perhaps to send a fellow caregiver a note thanking them for the way they live Love for others.

   There are many who could stand as symbols of great caregiving. Mother Theresa's is as fine an example as I know because of her personal decision to follow her unique calling: service to the poorest of the poor.

   Radical Loving Care is not about ordinary kindness. It is about living Love in ways most of us don't. Who among us offers Love to enemies? Which of us reaches beyond the easy comfort of our relationships with friends and neighbors to touch the hearts of the most lonely and the most neglected?

   Mother Theresa did these things every day. She lived Love even when she herself harbored painful doubts about God.

   Her courage and endurance were legendary. Her Love was sublime.

   Yet, this day is not only about Mother Theresa. It is about you.

   You are the one we celebrate today. You, who walk lonely hallways in the middle of the night to care for semi-conscious people in need. You, who choose each day to walk into a world of illness to relieve suffering. You who live Love.

   So many of us take jobs for money. Caregivers are never paid enough for the hard work they do.

   Celebrate each other today. Celebrate yourself. You are living the richest calling life offers. You are a caregiver!

-Rev. Erie Chapman

Note: Special thanks from all of us to Liz Wessel for sharing her artistic gifts as well as her writing and caregiving.

Days 237-239 - The Caregiver's Harvest

 "...life's waves crash in on us, taking back, leaving remnants and loss on her shore." - Liz Wessel

   I happened to read Liz's weekend essay about balance and loss at an odd time. Just prior to seeing it, I had spent an hour looking at home movies of my family in 1990. Whether you have home movies, or scrapbooks, or other ways of recollecting, you know the poignancy of remembering.

   "Life's waves" from that year twenty years ago crashed in on me as I looked at my father, energetic at eighty-five, dead five years later; at my late father-in-law, a physician caregiver, and my late mother-in-law, a caregiver as a teacher, mother, and nurse to her stroke-ridden husband in his last six years. 

   The only survivor of that generation is my mother a caregiver to her four children. She celebrated her 98th birthday on August 21.

   Most of all, I was struck by the images of my daughter, graduating from Andover and headed to Harvard that year, and my son (at left) just graduated from Harvard and working, at the time, in public service at a charity called City Year. Both children are now caregivers for their own children.

   There we all were, gathered around the Thanksgiving dinner table and then, later, appearing on the screen during the Christmas of 1990. The images have been hidden on videotape for two decades. They will be seen, if at all, only by the very few who are interested.

   For my wife, the pictures are too hard to watch just now. They awaken melancholy for what has been "lost on the shore" instead of joy.

   I was startled to see my forty-six-year old self on the screen, ten pounds lighter and looking like a kid at my own kid's graduations. I was president of Ohio's Riverside Methodist Hospital at that time and supervised the eleven thousand caregivers of the ten-hospital U.S. Health System. I thought (falsely, of course) I was a big deal back then and some part of me thought that time - our kids young, my wife and I in our forties -would last forever.  

   I wondered what Liz wrote about. What are the losses that you, as a caregiver, suffer as you dedicate yourselves to serving others outside their families?

   Every person who loves another is a caregiver. The time we spend doing that is never wasted. Still, life can often seem out of balance as we juggle family and work.  

   Obviously, we all need to make a living. Caregivers almost never get rich from their work. Yet, I can think of no calling more worthwhile. 

   The most important thing any of us can do is live Love by serving others. Anyone who follows their calling does that. Artists live Love by bringing beauty into the lives of others. If they are really good, they bring beauty into the lives of those who live long after them.

   I know a loving caregiver named Diana Gallaher who brightens the lives of elderly people who are at risk for being ignored. I know a world-class story teller named Minton Sparks who lives Love by bringing the light of her gifts to thousands. Both these women understand that all of our lives are stories. Whenever Ms. Sparks performs, she awakens the life stories of those in her audiences and their eyes shine with recollection.

   I know a former hospice executive named Karen York who spent an important chapter of her career helping people discover the power of Radical Loving Care.  I know a mission director at Saint Joseph Health System in California named Liz Wessel. She brings light to her work and, because of the way she lives Love, has brought joy to her family and friends as well.  

   Most caregivers I know sacrifice enormous amounts of their time on earth to heal those who will never remember them. Yet, their gifts involve bringing God's living water to those thirsty with need.  

   I thought of Jesus. Childless himself, his Love lights the lives of billions of God's children. 

   We are all children of God. From Moses to Jesus and now to us, caregivers know how powerful God's gift of Love can be. 

   There is loss on the shores of our lives, loss that rises and falls with each ebb and flow of life's waves. The sea also presents great gifts. 

   We can leave no greater treasure on the sands of the world than God's Love. In the giving of this gift, caregivers live the best energy of the eternal.

   Caregivers are fortunate. God has blessed them all.

-Rev. Erie Chapman 

NOTE: ON August 26 we will celebrate the first ever Caregiver's Day. On that date, the Journal will honor not only the anniversary of Mother Theresa's birth, but the gifts all caregiver's bring to the world.

Days 235-236 A Ship in Safe Harbor

Polyprint Watercolor, ~liz

I know what it means to live a relatively safe and predictable life. I have worked full time since beginning my nursing career in 1977. I have served at our home health ministry for over 20 years. I have shown up and tried to be there for those in need. I've held responsible positions because I was willing to give my all. My anxiety was such that I was relentless in my quest to achieve the best.

I did not know the meaning of balance.

Looking back, I have regrets related to the personal cost to my children and to me. Sure, they had their dad and grandma Wessel but often they did not have me. Even so, family was paramount to me. On weekends we were together for outings at the park with friends.Weekly gatherings for Sunday dinners were central in our lives. Our home was open to kids in the neighborhood as I enjoyed having our boys close and knowing they were safe.

Each year we ventured across country until my boys reached adulthood. It was important for them to know their grandparents, cousins, aunts and uncles. I wanted to create good memories. Lee moved to S. Dakota and has a family of his own now. John will graduate soon; fly off, perhaps to spend a year in S. Korea.

Now, I understand the meaning of a balanced work life.

I've lived a patterned illusion of safety for some time. Yet, as time passes, life's waves crash in on us, taking back, leaving remnants and loss on her shore. She awakens us from complacency to experience the precious gift of each day. To feel the exhilaration of being alive amid the ebb and flow of all that is.

Life is change. Change sweeps through us in unexpected ways. I realize that my soul has been patiently awaiting for a  window to open. Awaiting a day when I might be astonished by an unexpected turn of the page. To hear myself say, “I never could have imagined…”

Suddenly, I find my life shifting, stretching with new movement. My routines are unsettled and in a state of flux, my arms are loosening their grip on the familiar. It is a bit overwhelming, exciting, somewhat scary and definitely interesting. I feel a lightening up as predictable gives way to challenge and possibility.

Our Healthcare environment is continually imposing change upon us. Our natural tendency is to resist and to cling to our familiar ways of being. If we are not careful, we can become cynical and unyielding amid the chaos. Chaos can cause discomfort but also herald new life.  A chance to dream creatively, to envision what might be.

Erie instills in us his wise counsel; reminding us we only have two choices. He encourages us to live love, not fear. The voice of self-doubt whispers to me. I hear the stories it wants me to believe but then I remember to turn towards Love's light, only to find You ever near.

~Liz Sorensen Wessel

 

Days 233-234 - Invitation vs. Threat

   When my son got old enough so that I thought he needed to be disciplined, I thought I had two basic choices: Punish him or reward him. Obviously, most interactions by most parents involves some blend of the above.

   Love offers a much better guide. As soon as possible, invite your child to develop his or her own ability to makes decisions grounded in Love. Imagine how much more effective this could be than you having to provide the discipline all the time. Although this other approach requires much more sophistication and patience it typically yields better results.  

   Leadership is equally complex. Unfortunately, the majority of leaders have decided there is only one way to handle what they view as a substandard performance by an employee. Their regular approach is to use punishment.

   Here is the problem for caregivers: Punishment relies on the power of fear. Love's alternative looks something like an invitation.

   Imagine that you are dealing with someone for whom you have leadership responsibility. What if you entered a pattern of encounters with this person in which you described the best behavior, invited them to engage that pattern, and then encouraged them (rather than threatening them) to perform to a new standard, supporting them along the way?

   The advantage of this choice is that this kind of leadership is much more consistent with loving care. It will soon generate much better behaviors grounded in personal decisions rather than in your discipline. 

   Punishment makes most people nervous. It causes them to adapt to the ideas of someone else rather than their own.

   Self-motivated people who are treated like responsible adults are far more likely to deliver the kind of care we seek. This is because they will use their own best gifts, not another person's.

   The finest leaders practice the art of invitation and offer guidelines, encouragement and training. The least effective leaders resort to the short cuts of threats and punishment.

   Loving leadership requires more sophistication and thought than does threats. It calls us to engage not only our best gifts, but to awaken the better angels in each other.

-Rev. Erie Chapman

Days 230-232 - The Moral Test & The Mother Test

   Each day, we decide whether living Love, not fear, is, or is not, in our best interest. Each time we allow anxiety into our hearts, we have opened the door to fear. Only, Love can expel fear. Why wouldn't we always choose Love?

   My Mother Test poses the biggest and best challenge to hospitals, charities and caregivers. If your mother comes to the place where you work, how confident would you be that she would be treated with Loving care by everyone she encounters?

   The Moral Test is for each of us. It flows from the Mother Test. The Moral Test for caregivers is not only how we treat the hardest diagnoses but how we treat the meanest acting patients.

   My Moral Test for a leader is this: How lovingly do you deal with the organization's most difficult employees? (The Mission Test for hospitals is, of course, how well they do in passing meeting or exceeding the above standards.)

   If you agree with these standards, I hope you will make them your own. If you find your work is becoming too "easy," or, perhaps, too tiresome, it may be worth reconsidering how well you are doing in passing these tests. Sustaining Loving care is very hard work. It is a daily challenge as well as a lifetime one.  

   Forget your mother for a just a moment. What if you came to your organization in need. How confident would you be that everyone you encountered would treat you with Loving care? How would you deal with them if they didn't?

-Rev. Erie Chapman 

Days 228-229 Thousands...

                          Tom's Mandala ~liz

In the summer of 1996, mom and I frequented a used bookstore in town. It was a magical place for me as I often came away with a special book to guide my spiritual path. I toured the narrow aisles to browse books set upon dusty old shelves. My eyes focused upon a book by Carl Jung. I thumbed the pages and discovered mandalas drawn by Jung’s patients. I was not interested in the analytical text but the colorful symbolic drawings captured me. In that precise moment I knew drawing mandalas was to become part of my spiritual journey throughout life.

Each drawing is a circle that to me, symbolizes God; Love without beginning or end. Curiously, I drew non-stop for the two weeks I was home in Vermont. The mandala pictured above I drew for my brother Tom  (colored pencils and magic markers). If you look closely, you might see an image of Tommy along side his beloved dog, Sadie (bottom circle, center of red portion).

Thousands

  Better than a thousand meaningless statements

is one meaningful word,

which having been heard,

brings peace.  

Better than a thousand meaningless verses

is one meaningful line of verse,

which having been heard,

brings peace.  

Better than reciting a hundred meaningless verses

is one line from the Path of Wisdom,

which having been heard,

brings peace.  

Greater in competition

than a person who overcomes

a thousand times a thousand people

is the person who overcomes self.  

Certainly, the better success is in the struggle with the

self

than in a struggle with others.

For someone who is mindfully self-directed

and always lives with relaxed self-control,

neither heavenly nor hellish spirit,

nor the powers of  force or evil

could turn such success into defeat.

  Adapted from the Dhammapada, Canto 8 (verses 100-103).  

Days - 226-227 - Re-Visiting "Silence"

[Note: Below is a short essay I first posted to the Journal in November, 2009. It is the first time I can recall re-running something and I hope it is helpful to you both this day and beyond.]

In silence we must wrap much of our life, because it is too fine for speech. - Ralph Waldo Emerson

   I reflect, just now, on the millions of patients lying in silence in hospitals, hospices and nursing homes. We are born into the company of our mothers. We may well die alone. 

   Yet, whether we are surrounded with legions or attended by a single caregiver, silence will still, as Emerson writes, "wrap much of our life." And most of us don't know words that can begin to describe the texture of our innermost selves.  

   What is the quality of your silence? How much of your thought-life centers on lists of things to do and how much of your mind floats towards reflection and ideas?

   Caregivers offer some of their best healing through silent presence. It is often not our words that heal but the love in our eyes, the kindness in our hands, and the way we stay near to a person in pain.

   What is the color of your silence?

-Rev. Erie Chapman

Days 223-225 - Mystery & Humility

   On the last morning of his life, renown impressionist painter Pierre Renoir said, "I think I'm beginning to know something about painting." In his seventy-eight years, Renoir (1841-1919) created more than four thousand finished works. Among them are some of the most gorgeous creations ever seen.

   In his final hours, instead of crowing about his astounding artistic accomplishments, Renoir recognized that he was still "a beginner." In his humility, he always knew that his best work had not come from him, but through him.

   All who of us who struggle to help others through caring or through creating enter an intimate mystery. If we persist in our quest and never give up (except to God), we will gain glimpses of Love.

   At the beginning of our lives, we enter our own personal mystery. Along the way, each of us is invited to travel deeper into this mystery. Many turn down their invitation very early. The most successful among us, particularly saints, healers, and other exceptional performers (along with millions we have never heard of) have experienced many sacred encounters. 

   Like explorers, the best of us have gone on a hard and dangerous journey into unchartered lands. Upon returning, these "explorers" try, through art, literature, song or science, to describe to us what they have "found." The great scientists or inventors create theories or show us discoveries that may change the world.

   We need to celebrate these great gifts as coming from the holy, not from the person.

   Why are Renoir's paintings (like the nude, above) considered so exceptional? Renoir himself said that great art is "inimitable and indescribable."

   No wonder words fail us. How can even the most eloquent among us describe the peaks of our climactic passion or the shattering darkness of our pain? 

   The sacred is a spiritual encounter, not an analytical thought. If we sustain our curiosity and keep trying, as do the finest artists and scientists, the door will crack open for some ecstatic moments.

   The strangest part of the adventure into sacred mystery is the paradoxical balance. We are required to engage both hard work and complete surrender. If "success" comes through hard work, why, we ask, are supposed to "surrender?"

   Loving caregivers know the answer. They know Love comes when we combine skilled effort with compassion, knowing all along that this prepares the pathway for God's healing grace.

   The world calls us to work. When our work is informed by God, it becomes transcendent, whether or not the world notices.

   There is no "trick" to finding God. We all know, or at least sense, our role. When we answer our calling to be caregivers, we begin to align our energy with God's Love. 

   As we work to fulfill our calling, we are already living this Love. Love is always waiting to enter our hearts. But, it can only come through the door of humility.

   Failure comes exclusively to those who give up, closing their hearts to God. None of us can truly succeed without engaging Love's energy.

  Age and an agonizing case of arthritis did not cause Renoir to quit living his life's invitation. Instead, he had his paint brushes bound to his hands so he could continue to express the creative energy that ran through him. 

   Renoir's hard work and humility enabled him to paint Love's truth during his career. He saw this truth again with particular clarity on the last day of his life.

-Rev. Erie Chapman 

Days 221-222 A Love That Knows No Bounds

Sometimes love manifests in the most unique and unexpected ways.

Recent Journal reflections have delved into our need to belong amid the tension of wanting to live a truly authentic life. Too often we may mold and conform ourselves in an effort to fit in. The years flood by until one day we no longer recognize the person in the mirror. We may feel as though we have lost touch with the passion that sparks our wonder at being alive. The discontent of dreams lost can shake us from our sleep. Herein lies the blessing; the chance for re-awakening.

Animals are not indoctrinated into the same societal norms and cultural mores as we humans. The following is a delightful story of the power of Love. We can learn a lot from a crow and a kitten. ;-) ~liz

Thanks to Bill Gayle for sharing this remarkable story.

Days 219-220 - What Difference Do Stories Make?

"The world is made up of stories, not facts." - Rachel Remen, M.D.

   Fact: A man named Jesus of Nazareth was born in Bethlehem two thousand years ago. Fact: He walked around teaching people about love. Fact: He was crucified by Romans for claiming to be the Messiah.

   Do these facts tell us anything meaningful? Not much. Other people were born at the same time as Jesus. Others before and since have claimed to be messiahs and some of them were also crucified.

   Two billion Christians have been drawn to their faith not by facts, but by the enormous power of what some call "The Christian Narrative." It is the story of Jesus' life, death, and resurrection as the son of God that matters. It is his story of Love, told in teaching and through parables, that endures. And, for Christians, it is our faith in Jesus' story that transforms us from skeptics to believers.  

   Imagine this scenario for yourself. Fact: You are a caregiver. Fact: You have Crohn's disease, an auto-immune illness which causes inflammation in your intestinal tract. It will torture either your small or large intestine or both. You will suffer.

   What do these "facts" tell your caregivers? They may help your doctors "fix" some symptoms of your illness. But, healing - especially with a chronic illness, doesn't come through facts and fixing.

   Nurses, medical students, law students, and other professionals find that facts are heavily emphasized in their training. But, as a law student and subsequently as a trial attorney, I found that the story was far more powerful to juries than the apparent significance of facts.

   Since, in our scenario you are a caregiver, your Crohn's disease will lenable you to empathize with others who suffer from chronic illness. It is how the story of your life unforlds, with Crohn's (or anything else) that determines everything that counts.

   Because, chronic illnesses are by definition, incurable. The question becomes not how your illness will be "fixed," but how you will live a fulfilling life with your disease.

   Step one on the journey for a successful life is for patients to avoid being defined by their illness. In other words, the key role for caregivers is to help the sick remember that their life story is far more important than any "fact" of an illness.

   Dr. Rachel Remen should know. As I mentioned in yesterday's essay, Dr. Remen, was diagnosed with Crohn's even before she attended medical school. I received the same diagnosis at age nineteen before I had finished college or begun law school. Like Dr. Remen, I was told I was at high risk for cancer and might not live to age forty.

   After my diagnosis, my doctor told me a story. "Here's your situation," he advised me. "Your illness is very vulnerable to stress. Therefore, you should chose as low stress a job as possible."

   "I was planning to go to law school," I answered.

   "Out of the question," my doctor said. "A high stress profession like that could kill you even sooner than forty."

   My doctor tried to write my life story for me. But, sitting at home nursing my illness was not what I had in mind.

   Fortunately, of course, I ignored my doctor. I decided to live as many of my dreams as I could. Forty-seven years later, I'm still doing that.

   "No story is ever finished," Dr. Remen says. Our death does not stop our story. Imagine if Jesus had listened to his critics instead of to God? 

   Of course, we are not Jesus. But, each of us has the opportunity to live God's Love instead of hiding in fear.

   You may not have Crohn's disease. But, most of us have something that plagues us chronically - either physically or spiritually or both.

   I was afraid when I first learned of my illness. Gradually, I have let Love replace that fear.

   Fixing a broken leg is important. People of Jesus' time with leprosy, blindness, paralysis, or any other physical problem understandably wanted Jesus' to "fix" them. Because Jesus' Love was so great, he accommodated as many of these people as he could.   

   But, Jesus knew that his principle mission on earth was much greater. He knew that the problem with human beings was not, and is not, leprosy or blindness. It is fear.

   Jesus didn't come to "fix" us. He came with a new teaching. "Love one another," he told his followers. And then he shocked his audience with an even more daunting commandment, "Love your enemies."

   It is this particular kind of Radical Loving Care that patients need from their caregivers. They need us to Love them with both skill and kindness. To do this, we need to start by loving ourselves.   

  The facts on the patient's chart are only a small part of the patient's story. Our life story is who we are. Ultimate healing will come through the Love within each of us, not from the facts outside.  .

-Rev. Erie Chapman 

Days 216-218 Compassion at Eye Level

 "Fixing is too small a strategy to deal with loss." - Rachel Remen, M.D.

   Dr. Remen (in photo at left) should know. She lost her health to Crohn's disease as a very young person. She was told by her doctor (as was I with the same diagnosis) that she might not live to age forty.

   Our health is so precious to us that the loss of it sends us racing to doctors to "fix" what's wrong. As Dr. Remen so accurately states, "fixing is too small a strategy" for such a loss.

   Reverend Marcy Thomas' adult life story is pockmarked with cancer and other serious health problems. Her husband died of cancer. One dark day, her doctors told her that she, too, had the dreaded disease.. She has survived that diagnosis and much more.

   Recently, she awoke in severe pain - the kind of toxic mix of all-over and specific pain that causes most people to dial 911. Marcy managed to drive herself to the same hospital where she tends the sick.

   Over the next days, doctors struggled to diagnose her problem, to "fix" her. Finally, one physician serving a senior fellowship, chose to review some possible diagnoses in Marcy's presence. "It could be a lesion or a mass," the doctor intoned.

   "The blood drained from my face," Marcy told me. The horrors of all her past troubles flooded in upon her heart, bring with them fear and dread. Marcy's daughter is close to delivering her first child. Would Marcy live to grandparent this child?

   Suddenly, the physician, noticing Marcy's concern, did something all too unusual among medical professionals. She actually got down on her knees, so as to be at Marcy's eye level, and said, "I'm so sorry. I know your history. What I just said must have been so frightening to you." 

   Touched by this eye-level compassion from a doctor (the kind of thing Rev. Thomas thought only chaplains might do) Marcy said she actually began to feel better. Kind words helped healing.

   The doctor showed she could hear the fear in Marcy's heart. She went beyond words. Living Love, she knelt down to meet the deeper need of another. 

   Perhaps you feel otherwise, but it seems important to me that the doctor kneeled instead of leaning down. Leaning down can signal pity. Kneeling to the eye level of a prostrate patient demonstrates, in this case, compassion. For a moment, the doctor surrendered her commanding position as a powerful, healthy, upright, highly trained, stethoscope-draped professional and became a vulnerable human sharing Love with another weakened by illness.

   Of course, the delivery of compassion is an art, not something to be learned from an instruction book. There is always the risk of melodrama that can embarrass the patient instead of healing. My sister, a little person, hates it when people bend down to talk to her. It not only causes her to feel like a child, but draws unwanted attention to her difference from others.

   How do we know what to do and when? Love, if we are tuned to her voice, always offers the right answer.

   Fortunately, no lesion was found. Marcy is in the process of writing thank you notes to her caregivers. She intends, as well, to track down the physician who went from accidentally scaring her to intentionally loving her. Reverend Thomas wants to be sure this doctor knows how healing compassion can be.

-Rev. Erie Chapman