Addressing Compassion Fatigue without Succumbing To Toxic Anger
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When faced with the perception of overwhelming difficulties, potential responses to meet them become smaller and smaller, with the result being that simply doing anything, and by anything is meant the most emotionally salient, becomes increasingly easy to justify. This is why, beyond the proximal anonymity afforded by being online, social media interactions can be so toxic. Anger provides a really nice feedback loop where it certainly feels like you’re doing something because the fight/flight system(s) has gotten involved. But that same anonymity also makes every problem perceptually bigger than it actually is, not least because it’s “out there” and larger than life, but the internet is just so huge that voices, even small ones, take on an overly important weight.
Simply noting that the difficulties are overwhelming, in no small part due to one’s perception of them, does not diminish the feeling of impotence that creeps up like a particularly stealthy predator. One has very little difficulty finding almost transcendental issues, let alone existential ones, to be quickly overwhelmed by, including global climate change, the ubiquitous persistence of governmental corruption, and the puerile nature of identity politics. When faced with the Goliath’s of human-made debacles, the feeling can provide great fodder for a life filled with and defined by angry contrariness, each moment screaming to be punctuated by protest behavior of various forms.
The most important quality of protest behavior is that you’re seen and feel to be doing something, even, or in some cases particularly if the behavior doesn’t have any hope of making any changes. The protest is the point because it’s already assumed that the solution is impossible to achieve. I’m reminded of the dog wanting to chase a car, with the question being whether the dog knows at all what would happen if they were to actually catch it, and certainly not aware that were they to do so, it likely wouldn’t end with the car bowing to the dog’s superiority.
For those dedicated to virtue-signaling their way to social consequences they hope to not be a part of (Rob Henderson’s notion of luxury beliefs is great for exploring this), contemplating anything other than anger as an end in itself is largely useless. Stopping traffic on busy highways, wearing ridiculous outfits to protest saunters (I refuse to call them marches), and shouting down speakers at schools are not about standing for anything but the banal narcissism of the terminally online.
Rather, contemplation is for the compassion fatigued of the majority of us, those who look at the broader picture, see the incremental (and often only possible) changes to be done and sigh in heartbreak at how long ideals take to bear fruit. This weary wariness need not lead to being contrary and a fully cynical outlook. While there is a certain passion to be found in bashing oneself against nearly immovable objects, an equal, if not more powerful, life can be had by focusing on an actively engaged relational existence.
1. Promote the positive growth of personal relationships
Whatever one may call family, friends, lovers, partners, co-workers, etc., all provide individual seas of near-infinite exploration. This is life itself, the integrative interactive play of relational dynamics, providing the foundation for every social construct we attempt to mold it into. What we do in each and every one of our actions is a complex relational dynamic with every person around us. Therefore, what we do has influence, not because we direct it to be so, but because such influence is inevitable based on the relational nature of reality. Consciously and actively promoting the growth of each connection means providing a positive space for the exploration of self in relation to others. How often do we find aspects of ourselves we enjoy but didn’t know existed due to a new relationship? This goes beyond new hobbies and interests, though those are true as well, but new sources of laughter, ideas for exploration, and ways of being. Every connection has this latent potential if we but seek to discover it.
2. Feeling contrary, seek to be surprised
Surprise, or even awe, stems directly from the growth of connections, dwelling happily in the humility coming from the tentative nature of knowledge. Seeking surprise is about glorying in the search for the frontiers of discovery, actively seeking and appreciating being wrong. Doing so doesn’t mean jettisoning all ideas with every piece of new information; it means skeptically inquiring as to the limits of your worldview. This inquiry is not merely external; knowledge doesn’t exist apart from the knower. Psychological research notes that as we actively explore the various selves that contribute to our personal narrative, creativity can blossom into new forms of behavior and ways of dealing with difficulties. Too often, we look at relationships as external interactions in the real world. There are just as many occurring internally, in the interplay of our various selves. How does the “workplace” you connect with and expand upon the “at-home” you and/or the “out-with-friends” you? Seeking surprise is as much finding out the limits of our knowledge as it is determining the edges for growth in our self-reflection.
3. Contribute daily to the happiness around you
This may sound like an overly long bumper sticker, but in the face of problems larger than I can manage alone, contributing to a smile or a laugh is the kind of victory in the face of defeat that makes each day worth living. Taken together with the previous two points, spreading happiness means humbly accepting that what a person does is not always personally directed, and how I respond may very well inspire a connection that otherwise I’d have thought impossible. In every disagreement, there is still shared humanity that is worth exploring, for just as we are not bound by any individual thought we express, neither is anybody else. Happiness is smiles and laughter, but it is also forgiveness and understanding.
The sheer scope of the difficulties facing humanity makes it impossible for anyone, likely not even a group of people, to define all the solutions. These issues should not be ignored, but the weight of that knowledge can be overwhelming, to the point where it feels like empathy is more of a curse than a blessing. Living a philosophy based on 1) positive relational growth, 2) seeking surprise, and 3) contributing to happiness expands compassion without the crushing impact of the seemingly impossible. Perhaps, just maybe, the solutions will arise when the impulse to simply be contrary is expanded within more people to include standing for our shared humanity.