I sit down to check and respond to emails. I am interrupted every 45 seconds by my daughter who feels the need to show me how cute the cat is. Or by the cat who feels the need to show me how cute the cat is. The kid leaves. I tackle the small pile of paperwork, financial stuff, and personal agenda items that are piling up. I nearly complete several of them, each time discovering that I need to print out some version of some form and mail it in (really? REALLY?). At this point I also discover that my black ink cartridge requires replacing, and that there is NO WAY that my printer will do anything until I replace it. I put in a load of laundry. I do some more computer stuff – writing, marketing, etc. I put in another load of laundry. It is now 11:00 am.

I make a list of errands. Oh good! Several of them are in the same neighborhood! That will be convenient. But the major, six-lane road that runs through the commercial area I need to go to is down to one lane. A nine minute trips takes 25 minutes and ten dollars in gas.

Okay! Banking done! Easy trip into the office supply store only two blocks away, and I can turn right! I get to store and find the dizzying array of cartridges. I forgot the old ones for exchange, but that’s okay; I know what I need. But do they have it? I have to buy the pack with ALL the colors. Suddenly, however, things are looking up. The SodaStream cartridge I need to exchange can be exchanged here at the office supply store. Hurray! One fewer stops.

Grocery store is next. I decide on the expensive store because with the construction, it’s easier to get to and I only need a few things. Good. Done. Next is the co-op. One of the things I need is here, but not all three. I buy it and head across town to a shop I’m pretty sure will have it. They have one of the things I need. I buy it. I accept a moderately reasonable substitute for the third. Done. Home.

Oh crap. It’s my turn to drive to track practice today. That’s okay. I head home, unload purchases and begin to cook lunch. I each lunch and switch laundry. It is now 2:10 pm. I pull out the ink cartridges to print out forms and get them in the mail. I tear open the black cartridge. Yup, that’s it. Except it’s not. It is smaller. Just a little. It is now 2:15 and I know that there is no way I can get to the store and back by 3:00 to get the kids for track.

To review: I spent the bulk of the day on little stuff. I had a plan to do some big projects today. Big ones. Or at least get a lot done on one of them. By the way, did I mention that I have family in town and I’m in charge of dinner tonight.

Ok. It’s 2:39. Time to check the laundry and get the kids from the southwest of my house, drive them to the northeast of my house, then go to Staples further southwest of my house, go to my sister’s even further northeast of my house…

You get the idea.

The idea of the virtue of self-sacrifice is bullshit. Those who practice the greatest quality of giving are not sacrificing. They are those for whom the act of giving of themselves is their heart’s desire, so it’s really no sacrifice at all. The trouble comes when boundaries are not good, and it becomes an act of martyrdom, of giving up a piece of who you are. When we give up  parts of ourselves, we become resentful, weak, sad. We are no longer giving to the world in a way that is a mutually beneficial way. We are giving up the resources that make the world a more whole and lovely place. We are taking away from, not giving to. We are squandering resources that can be spent elsewhere, in ways and in places that are creative, not destructive.

Understand that giving with an open heart does not mean giving up everything. Having a healthy boundary with giving of oneself does not diminish the giving, it enriches it. It’s like managing a resource, like timber. Clear cutting gains you much all at once, but it spoils the producing land. Responsible tree harvesting allows that forest to continue to give over a very long time.

One of the first things an herbalist learns about harvesting plants is to only take a third of what is growing, so that next time she comes back, there will be more to harvest. This is an important thing to think about when managing your personal resources. You are both the plant and the harvester; leave more than you think you need for yourself so there will be something to come back to later, and you can give with joy and energy as long as you live.

I have great admiration for those who did not have to learn the gift of putting their needs first, for caring for their soul. If you feel the need to give, give with your whole heart because it is the thing that also feeds you, but don’t serve others at the expense of serving yourself.

This was not about optimism, or putting a sunnier spin on the information. In other words, it was not about saying that in the case of a procedure with a 30% failure rate, you begin the conversation by saying, “Most patients have great results from this procedure.” It is about not giving accurate information about the severity or timeline of condition.

I couldn’t help but see this as an act of selfishness. No matter how you color it, it comes from the desire on behalf of the doc to avoid unpleasantness. It is uncomfortable to have to tell someone that they are dying, or that they are losing their sight. It may make them sad, or angry, or even hysterical. The thing that thee doctor who makes the decision to hide the truth from his or her patient is not taught to understand, is that the sadness, or anger, or freak-out is not their problem. They are not responsible for causing, or even stopping or dispersing the emotional reaction, only to bear calm and compassionate witness to it, and this is a very hard thing to do.

The reaction of a patient to news comes only from that patient. This is not to say that news should be shared in a callous manner, but it is not the physician’s job to decide what their patient can and cannot handle.

First of all, the doctor does not actually know how someone is going to react, and making that decision for him is disempowering. Even if their expectation turns out to be correct, that freak-out or emotional storm may be an important process for the patient to go through as part of the individual life journey he is on. It may even be his particular coping mechanism.

I heard a few reasons as to why a doctor might choose to do make this decision, but as far as I could tell, they were thinly veiled excuses. The one that really stood out was that the 15 minutes allowed for the appointment might not be adequate for a discussion of that level of seriousness. After consulting with a physician friend about this rationale, she made a face, and said, “Nooooooo”.

I would think that it would be ideal to say something like, “I’d like you to make another appointment in the next couple of days so that we can discuss the results of your tests.” It took me about 20 seconds to come up with that idea. And then, here’s another idea, have your scheduler make that person’s appointment the last one of the day so you don’t have anyone waiting. I was at an appointment like that when a friend had to have her skull cut open to remove a growth next to her brain. That doctor was smart enough to set the appointment up appropriately so that all the questions that anyone could possibly think to need answered could be given the time needed to handle it properly.

I understand. This is the really, really hard part of the job, but all the more reason it needs to be done properly. The problem, as I see it, is that it is also the part of a physician’s job that they are probably least adequately trained for, and that’s a shame. It’s unfair to send someone out to do this job and not to give them the foundational information necessary to do this most difficult task.

I have said this before (about a million times) and I’ll say it a million more; compassion is the dispassionate state in which one has the ability to be completely present with another person’s pain. It is the aspect of being in a position of caring for the well-being of others that is most important, and yet least frequently addressed. It is also the skill that allows these kind of difficult circumstances to be handled in a way that is real, moving, and generous. It is an opportunity for the kind of real human interaction that can really be a gift for everyone involved.

In each of these stories, it occurs to me that the largest obstacle that each individual encounters to establishing, recognizing, or enforcing boundaries is compassion, or at least the attempt to behave in a way that they define as compassionate. It’s made me consider how having good, healthy boundaries can be consistent with behavior that is compassionate and healthy.

Although I think the intricacies of this subject will be revealing themselves to me for some time to come, I have had a few insights.

I think that one of the largest sources of confusion, and the most likely reason for making bad choices around boundaries, is confusing being compassionate with being nice. Being “nice” is making decisions about your actions based on making someone happy in the moment. Being nice is great. It’s why we hold the door for someone, add a little extra to your tip, give up your seat on the bus, express your thanks. There’s a reason they are called “social niceties”. They are the small gestures that create goodwill and lubricate our social interactions. It is important, however, to make a distinction between the circumstances in which it is appropriate to smooth the path you cross with a gesture, and those in which it is important to make decisions that feed and support a more complex relationship.

The problem with basing decisions about your behavior on making someone happy in the moment is that it is not always the most compassionate, or the wisest action for the long term. Making children happy by feeding them nothing by macaroni and cheese and ice cream may create short term happiness. It may even make you feel good because they will be thrilled that they are able to get what they want and seem to be filled with joy and affection for you. But in the long term, they are going to suffer. They will fail to thrive appropriately, have low energy, become ill, and fail to function well in social and educational environments. It may break your heart in the moment to have to say “no” to a child, but as an adult, you know that setting up those boundaries is creating standards for health and behavior that are to everyone’s benefit.

This is a simplistic example for the exploration of boundaries and compassion. Most circumstances are not so straightforward. If they were, we wouldn’t be talking about it. Many factors enter in to our personal and professional interactions: other’s expectations, our own fears, concepts of professionalism, social mores, and the complex relationships people have with power, money, sexuality, and healing being only some of them. All these contribute to making boundary issues tricky, even impossibly confusing.

The thing that can help cut through the layers of complexity and confusion when dealing with issues of boundaries is that compassion is not always about making someone happy in the moment. That includes you. But it is important that it is also about caring about the well-being of those involved, without feeding into the dramatic story line that is unfolding, and that includes you as well.

Fences keep horses safe in their pasture, as well as out of the neighbor’s fields. The healthiest boundaries are those that protect the well being of all parties, even if they seem like a whole lot of NO FUN. Unraveling what, in fact, is the healthiest, most compassionate action can seem muddy on the surface when everyone’s narrative is trying to take center stage. Being quiet enough to go below all the noise, and fear, and self-absorption, including our own, is where we can find the path of wisdom.

The repercussions of this story have been echoing inside my head for the remainder of the morning. Every time I think of it, I find more layers and greater nuance.

Just off the top of my head, the wisdom that unfolded behind this story included the following:

• The bad behavior of others is not an excuse for bad behavior on your part.
• When you do the right thing, it makes things better for everyone.
• Even though someone else’s actions hinder your ability to see things clearly and function at your best, your actions can make it easier for others to see their way, and that’s a good thing.
• There’s no separation between us. When you take the needs of others to heart and action, it creates a little clarity and calm and eventually it comes around to you. This happens in the present, but may have even greater ramifications as it ripples through time.
• It’s not all about you.

I know that this is only the beginning of the ripples that this story will make in my consciousness, and in my behavior. I would love for others to share their reactions and responses. What did it mean to you, and how might it play out in your behavior?

Happy Birthday Dr. King.

Why does this day have so much more power to generate the desire to make ourselves better, our house cleaner, our time better spent? The first day of spring would serve as well, would it not? Those who celebrate the Celtic holidays find Imbolc (or however you choose to spell it), temporally congruent with Groundhog Day, to be the day to set new patterns for future behavior; I know someone who always cleans the hell out of her house that day.

There is, I think, a congruence of circumstances. The first, and perhaps most important, is the power of the numbers. The division of time into chunks that have distinct labels allows them to be handled as discrete units. This division means we can both literally and figuratively place our history for that chunk of time into folders, file them, and shut the drawer. The fact that this comes at the end of a period of frivolity and excess of eating, drinking and spending means that the pendulum naturally swings the other way and there is a tendency toward restraint and discipline, whether that means spending less money or dedicating our time more productively, whatever that means for you.

As much as I resist this artificial distinction of one particular day, January first is an imaginary line that our culture has chosen to draw. Ignoring the predominant mindset that I can hardly ignore, and bucking a cultural trend that is essentially worldwide (New Year’s Day is a very big holiday in Japan, for example) seems just contrary and obstinate. When in Rome (or New York, or Auckland)…

It seems it would take more effort to resist the trend than it would take to make good use of it. So, in the spirit of going with the flow, I will clean my floors, do some work, be kinder to others, and avoid sweets in attempt to set a trend of behavior for the next twelve months. What have I got to lose?

So I started in the most straight-forward, logical place: the dictionary. I checked three dictionary sources: Dictionary.com, Merriam-Webster, and Oxford, and each had a variation of the definition that I found interesting. Of course, they all had things in common, and the overtly religious definitions were not applicable, but they all had nuances that I found interesting for contemplation.

Dictionary.com’s entries included, “Reverently dedicated to some person, purpose, or object a morning hour sacred to study; and “Regarded with reverence: the sacred memory of a dead hero.”

Merriam-Webster had an even more nuanced approached, with definitions that included: “Worthy of religious veneration; entitled to reverence and respect; and  unassailable, inviolable, highly valued and important, a sacred responsibility.

The addition to this list that Oxford provided was “Regarded as too valuable to be interfered with; sacrosanct.”

I decided that, to a greater or lesser extent, all these things were true and applicable to my experience. It is important for me to recognize and remember that any place I do my work, office, classroom, or living room, is, in that moment a place that I need to dedicate to that purpose, and that it is, in that moment, always and constantly worthy of regard and reverence.

Recognizing the sacredness of that time together is an important thing for me to do regularly and constantly, before, during, and after a session. It is a gift that I have been given, and the experience of each individual needs to be seen as an act that has deep and profound value for both the receiver and the provider, neither one at the expense of the other. It is a holy union of a sort, one which needs to be allowed to unfold in its own way.

My responsibility is to facilitate it with expertise and respect, meeting each individual in their sacred space; my struggle is to discover and acknowledge it as it arises.

I am open to suggestions for things I could do to help remind myself. Comment below…

I found this somewhat inspiring. As a result, my goal is more posts. Some will be long and thoughtful, and some with be quick bits of insight, humor, self-discovery, or information that catches my attention.

In the meantime, I’d like to get those blogger posts over here to this blog in a way that is not stupid and time consuming. If you have any knowledge about how I might do this, please let me know.

In my previous posts on not killing and not taking what is not given, the precepts, which seem on the surface to have simple, straight-forward meanings and interpretations become more interesting and challenging when we allow ourselves to sink into their nuances. There is the version of each of these that is the sort of thing we teach children. “It’s not okay to hit.” “Don’t take things that don’t belong to you.” “Don’t tell me things that you know are not true.” And then there is the real life, grown-up applications. The grown up world is much more complex and layered and it is in these layers that the precepts become more useful.

Lying is a cooperative act. A lie’s power only emerges when someone agrees to believe it. On some level we are complicit in being fooled, and the balance between being open and trusting versus being vulnerable is a careful balancing act. When going to see someone perform stage magic, you even pay to believe someone’s lies. You may be lied to anywhere from 10 to 200 times a day, but how many more do you lie to yourself and how willing are you to believe them?

The subtlety of the lies, half-truths, and justifications that we use to deceive ourselves is such that without regular and consistent self-reflection, we will willingly and consistently continue to do so, only half-aware of our self-deception.

The aware half is the part that is conscious enough to make us recognize our deception, and this results in further lies to justify the ones we’ve already made, or, if we are aware enough, a guilty misery. This misery creates a great deal of suffering as we perceive this behavior as evidence of being of a flawed character and a less than ideal person, diminishing our self-respect and creating a layer of self recrimination and loathing that creates a dirty lens through which we see ourselves.

But do we not lie to ourselves in order to avoid suffering? The lies we use to justify our behavior only delude us. They create a layer of insulation from our suffering, pain, and sadness; they do not eliminate them. In the process, as we have seen, we actually cause ourselves more pain.

This is the most difficult and yet profoundly important application of the precept against lying. This is where the rubber meets the road and where we can begin to eliminate distress by eliminating lying at the root, at self-deception. It is important to note that the precept instructs us to be not only truthful, but to do so with discretion and a loving heart, and nowhere is this more important that in doing so when being truthful with ourselves.

Practicing a mindfulness is an opportunity for us to recognize our justifications, excuses and self-deception. Approaching our faults, shortcomings and errors in action or judgment with a soft heart, kindness, and compassion for ourselves will make for a soft landing. Be honest with yourself, but be gentle, and each time it will become easier to do.