Where did compassion go to die?

Are our heartless, soulless leaders a reflection of us after all?

It’s been a while since my ramblings brought me here. I’ve been off battling challenges, celebrating wins, mourning losses and growing through it all.

Today, more than 100 people died, burned to death – many beyond recognition – in a tragic fire accompanied by explosions at Kenya Pipeline Company (KPC). With many critically injured, the death toll will rise. It was a needless tragedy, completely preventable – and this fact angered many people. Kenyans on social networks expressed fury at our leaders for three valid reasons:

1. A few years ago, when KPC sought to evict people living around the pipeline (I’m not sure what the regulation distance is), area MPs led demonstrations and told the people to hold their ground and stay put. KPC sought to avert today’s disaster.
2. A few weeks ago, Kenyan parliamentarians cleaned out the country’s disaster preparedness fund to pay their back-taxes following a long standoff with the revenue authority.
3. The same granite-hearted predatory MPs turned up today to ‘show their support’ (I write that phrase with bile rising in my throat) for the community under fire.

These, and many more reasons, infuriate me too. However, they are not the reason I returned to to my long-neglected blog. Another group of angry Kenyans saddened my heart today. This group was angry with the people that went to draw oil from the leak, effectively placing themselves in harm’s way and possibly causing the fire. The heartbreaking and frightening thing about this anger was the subliminal (and frequently overt) message that they deserved what they got and don’t deserve help. They’ve been called ‘idiots’, among many unkinder adjectives.

I’m sure there are myriad views on this, and here is mine.

They shouldn’t have been there, drawing oil. It was a stupid, foolhardy thing to do. They fenced with danger and lost. Do they deserve to die or be maimed for life for their foolishness? I think that’s a pretty harsh sentence to pass on a bunch of hapless people.

See, you, me and the angry people on social networks today wouldn’t dream of doing something so stupid and dangerous.  We wouldn’t even be tempted to slow down near an oil leak, let alone go and draw from it. We also don’t live in the slum on one hundred shillings a day, if we’re lucky. Many of those people are men and women who get up every morning to queue at factories and construction sites in the hope of getting picked for that day’s casual labour roll. Many of them have families – wives, husbands, children, siblings – relying on their luck for a daily living. When they come across an oil leak, they don’t see danger; they see something they can sell or use to ease their burden for that one day. Those ‘idiots’ are driven by need, not greed. It doesn’t make what they did right, but it makes it sadder.

If you can’t find compassion in your heart for the ‘idiots’ driven by their poverty and desperation, then have some for their families – wives, husbands, children, siblings – who right now may not know where their loved ones (and breadwinners) are, or if they will live. Those families need help, not scorn. Do what you can for them. Do what you can to keep their loved ones alive. They cannot help themselves out of this because they are destitute, not because they are idiots.

Compassion (noun): sympathetic consciousness of others’ distress together with the desire to alleviate it (Merriam-Webster definition)

If your heart still doesn’t yield, consider this: such tragedy does not select the idiots and side-step the innocent. There are people today that died or are fighting for their lives because they were in the wrong place at the worst possible time. Since you can’t tell the difference, then help anyway – and hope you’re helping an innocent rather than an idiot.

If you’re reading this and thinking that coming out to help is doing the government’s job because you pay your taxes and your tax money should be helping the victims – you’re justified. But allow your compassion to be bigger than your indignation.

True – longterm sustainable solutions must be put in place to ensure that such needless tragedy is eliminated by sound and enforced regulation. If there are brilliant lawyers out there who can find constitutional ground to hold leadership accountable for this, then they must do so, and help ensure it never happens again. If there are brilliant journalists, bloggers and microbloggers out there who can dig up the history and put the shaming spotlight on our leaders, then they must do it.

The one thing that we can ALL do is help the victims.

Kenyatta National Hospital needs blood donors. It needs bed linen, towels and clothing for the victims. It needs food. It needs mineral water, because many burn victims die from dehydration. It needs heaters and blankets.

Step out in compassion, help the immediate need and then do everything within your capability and expertise to see that tragedy like this never happens again. Let’s be better than our leaders, and then hold them accountable.

Hell

~the place where good intentions go to die~

It’s said ‘the road to hell is paved with good intentions‘, and often it’s used in reference to good intentions that are never backed up by concrete action, resulting in a negative outcome. Over the past few weeks, I have come to see a different perspective on this: hell is the place where good intentions go to die, when all that you have intended for good has been taken and used (or interpreted) for evil.

This ends in a stalemate ‘damned if you do – damned if you don’t’ situation that is not only emotionally draining; it is painful too. What do you do when every effort you make for the good of another is interpreted as a selfish intervention to have things your way? What do you say when every attempt to explain your point of departure is thrown back in your face as you ‘always having to be right’? I’m beginning to think that the answer to those questions is ‘Nothing’. There is nothing you can do or say to convince another of your good intentions, unless and until they are willing to believe that you are after their success. There is nothing you can do about the other person’s perspective.

It’s frustrating and you want to throw your hands up, give up and just walk away from it all. You want to stop giving a damn about how the other person feels and to stop trying. You almost want to show them what that selfish and self-righteous person they imagine you are really looks like. You do none of these things, however, because when you’re being true to yourself -and when you’re not feeling so affronted- you know that you’re coming from a genuine place of love and you can’t just turn it into indifference.

However, you don’t know how much longer you can take being misunderstood. If there is a happy ending to this story, I haven’t found it yet -but I’m still searching for answers. I have a lot of questions about Love and all its enduring qualities described in the Bible (but that is the subject of another day’s post). If I do find the answer, I’ll revisit this post and share it. If you have the answer – I’m listening.

Cut YOU some slack!

Those who love you are not fooled by mistakes you have made or dark images you hold about yourself. They remember your beauty when you feel ugly; your wholeness when you are broken; your innocence when you feel guilty; and your purpose when you are confused.

~Alan Cohen -Inspirational Author, Speaker and Teacher

I stumbled on this quote and it stayed with me for days. It got me thinking  about how often we believe we don’t deserve to be loved, to be forgiven, to be cut some slack. This belief is born out of a painful awareness of everything we are -and everything we are not- that we wish was different.  Because we are our own worst critics, it’s often said.

When’s the last time you stopped to look around you and see all the people that mirror your beauty, your wholesomeness, your innocence and your purpose back at you? Call it counting your blessings, stopping to smell the roses, having an attitude of gratitude…fact is, there is so much beauty all around you.

Most important: YOU are part of it. There’s much virtue in self-affirmation…it needn’t be the stuff of which vanity is made.

Taking stock…one year on.

Today I’m a year older. It’s been 12 months; 52 weeks; 365 (and a quarter?) days. Enough time for plenty to have happened. So why do I feel like I’m in exactly the same place where I was on this day in 2009?

It would be inaccurate to say that nothing has changed. A lot has -or a lot did. But life came full circle and brought me back to where I began -at least that’s the way it feels.

And yet I am not the same person I was, on this day in history. I’m wiser: some of the wisdom gained through experiences best forgotten; yet they shape (or do they? Should they?) whom I am becoming.

I am more tolerant of imperfection -in myself and in others. I have learned, from disappointment, to manage my expectations a little better. That the higher I set my expectations, the longer the drop to reality. Standing on the threshold of a new year in my life, I am not sure if this is a learning that I want to let shape my world view. But it is what it is.

I have gained renewed respect for my ability to bounce back from rock-bottom. Frankly, I would rather not have had to go there in the first place.

I have heightened appreciation and respect for my parents, my sisters, my friends: the people in my life that are there even when I allow life to turn me into unpleasant company; the people who are there to celebrate my success and remind me how far I have come: the people who remind me that I’m worth too much to settle for less than I deserve.

I suppose, despite my life coming full circle, I am not the same person I was then. Sadly, there is much purity that has been lost and skepticism has taken its place. On the other hand, however, perhaps a measure of skepticism goes a long way to making me consider my choices a lot more closely.

I guess it has not been a total waste of a year of my life, after all. I have much to be thankful for, and I give thanks. I have learned what it means to put my faith and trust in God, to surrender to His will for my life and stand on His promises even when my reality appears to be crumbling around me.

‘Nobody told me the road would be easy, but I know he never brought me this far to leave me’

~Mary Mary

The state of being thankful

If the only prayer you said in your whole life was “Thank you”, that would suffice.

~Meister Eckhart

GRATITUDE (n): the state of being thankful (Merriam-Webster dictionary).

I like this definition. It tells me that gratitude isn’t something that I feel; it’s something that I AM -a state of being. I can be disappointed that my desired outcome was elusive -or I can be grateful that I got the chance to try and learned some valuable (one day they will be) lessons along the way. I can be angry that someone I trusted lied to me over and over -or I can be grateful that it never went on longer than it had to. I can be resentful of a lot of things and people that test my limits every day -or I can be grateful that they teach me more about myself.

I know…a lot of waxing lyrical, this. It is easier to talk about gratitude than be grateful, a lot of the time. But it’s true what they say: it is fairly impossible to harbour gratitude and any kind of negativity in one heart. No matter how dire a situation, there is always, always, always something to be grateful for, however small, in the midst of it -you just have to look for it. And looking for it forces your focus to shift away from the negative and onto happier thoughts. And the better you get at gratitude, the better you get at holding onto faith, and keeping hope alive.

Hope is the thing with feathers, that perches in the soul

And sings the tune without the words, never stops at all

~Emily Dickinson~

Keeping faith under fire

16 Shadrach, Meshach and Abednego replied to the king, “O Nebuchadnezzar, we do not need to defend ourselves before you in this matter. 17 If we are thrown into the blazing furnace, the God we serve is able to save us from it, and he will rescue us from your hand, O king. 18 But EVEN IF HE DOES NOT, we want you to know, O king, that we will not serve your gods or worship the image of gold you have set up.”

~Daniel 3: 16-18

It’s easy to trust God when everything is dandy and all my ducks are neatly lined up. Those are the days I feel like I’m God’s hotstepper…everything works according to His will, and I’m perfectly in sync with Him (or maybe He’s in sync with me!). I’m untouchable, unstoppable. That’s when the spiritual matches my reality. “God is good” comes easily.

When trial comes, at first, it’s still easy to trust God. Scripture about victory over my circumstances are on the tip of my tongue and I can walk tall despite the manifestation in my reality. At first. Fast-forward to a few weeks -maybe even months- later, when said trial has dug its heels in despite my confessions of faith and expectation of victory in His name. I decide “I’m going to fast over this issue as it looks like it’s a big one”.  So, fast I do. The result? The situation becomes as bad as it could possibly get. It’s like God took a stroll with his iPod while I was fasting, and evil went to town on my life. Then trust drops to 4^th or 5^th place, overtaken by doubt, fear, a sense of helplessness…maybe even anger easily directed at God: Where is He when I need Him most?!

I am learning slowly -I really hope that this lesson is kept to nibble-sized modules!- that I have to be able to trust God’s promises, even when my reality seems to say He’s gone walkabout. It’s easier said, really, but it’s true. When I feel abandoned in the midst of suffering, does Jeremiah 31:3 speak comfort to me? When I feel like I’ve hit a dead end at full speed, does Jeremiah 29:11 speak assurance to me? When I feel threatened by my circumstances, does Isaiah 41:10 give me courage to forge ahead?

Can I trust God’s heart, even when I cannot see His hand? Do I trust him even when things do not seem to be panning out the way I hoped, even as I prayed ‘your will be done’?

When things are fine and dandy, I come to know God as my SHIELD -keeping me out of the fire.

When trials come, faced with prayer and followed by quick victory, I come to know God as my DELIVERER -saving me from the fire.

When trials come, unrelenting despite prayer, fasting, waiting on God and repeating the cycle, if I remain firmly rooted in his Word, standing on His promises, I will come to know God as my Comforter, the God who says: “When you pass through the waters,
I will be with you; and when you pass through the rivers, they will not sweep over you. When you walk through the fire, you will not be burned; the flames will not set you ablaze” (Isaiah 43:2)

Keeping faith under fire is probably where it counts most; it is therein that I am tested and I grow. It is also a massive journey of trust. It is trusting God despite the outcome and not only for the outcome.

Can you love when it hurts?

Love is patient, love is kind. It does not envy, it does not boast, it is not proud. ⁵It is not rude, it is not self-seeking, it is not easily angered, it keeps no record of wrongs. ⁶Love does not delight in evil but rejoices with the truth. ⁷It always protects, always trusts, always hopes, always perseveres

~ 1 Corinthians 13:4-7

Unconditional love is the hardest sort to give. It demands giving of your love, and expecting nothing back in return. It goes against human nature. We give to get. And when we don’t get what we expect or what we think we deserve, first recourse is to withdraw. We give love conditionally.

Conditional love demands that the recipient live up to your expectations; be who you want them to be. Conditional love lavishes praise when it gets what it wants; sulks and criticises when it doesn’t. It’s like auto response to stimulii.

Unconditional love accepts the other person as they are; loves them for everything they are, everything they’re not, everything they could be and all that they will never be. It loves even when it hurts.

I wonder if unconditional love is something anyone can give more than once in a lifetime.

Shifting expectations

Manage your expectations and you will seldom be disappointed

I’ve heard it said: ‘Expect nothing and you will never be disappointed’.

I disagree. On the contrary, I have long believed that if you expect and accept nothing less than your personal best, then you will usually get it.

Recently though, I learned differently

People do not always let us down. Frequently enough, it is our expectations that do, either because they are un-communicated or unrealistic.

Granted, there are those people that disappoint consistently and painfully. With these people, we gradually manage our expectations down to zero. But if we’re honest –and I’m trying to be here -, those people are the exception, not the norm.

I recently had what felt like an intense short course in shifting expectation. I felt let down by someone whom I felt should have known better –well enough to do different. And once my feelings of grave disappointment and attitude of judgement abated, I realised that the other person had simply failed to live up to an expectation that I had not communicated.

I had not let them know what I expected, and not because I imagined I was dealing with a clairvoyant, but because of the very natural tendency to hold others to my own standard, and expecting them to react to my circumstances the way I would react had the the shoe been on the other foot.

Big mistake. Not to be unkind to myself, but I was probably responsible for my own disappointment, in this instance.

This also got me wondering: “If I had communicated my expectation, could I really have expected them to drop everything, jump to it and deliver to script?” As much as I would like that to be the case, the honest answer is that it would likely be an unrealistic expectation. 

Realistic would have been expecting them to do the best they can to meet my communicated expectation, and we usually know when someone’s done their best.

Managing expectations is about communicating them and then accepting somebody’s best. After all, the worst that could happen is that the problem would be half-solved and the solution half-achieved.

In the moment

The last time I was here, I was rushing change…feeling it, nearly touching it and yet not knowing what direction it would come from, or what it would bring. My circumstances haven’t changed –I am still there. But I have changed…I’ve come to learn that I am exactly where I need to be. I have learned that I have to embrace this moment: soak it in, make the best I can with it, learn what I must from it…and only then will I be ready and equipped to move on to the next big thing.

Funny how much emotional, spiritual and mental exhaustion it has cost me to learn this. Even more interesting is how when weariness finally stopped me in my tracks, my spirit sort of just opened up and I saw just how full my life is and I was able to appreciate the here and now (smelling the roses, if you will).

Don’t misunderstand me –I haven’t stopped horizon-gazing; I’m impatient, and that’s alright because patience is an overrated virtue anyway! But the anxiety is gone from it and I’m able to look forward to the future in the assurance that everything in my present is preparing me for a purpose. And while I’m here, I am sorting and sifting all the things (and some people too) that I will leave behind and those that will go the distance.

When change tarries

See, I am doing a new thing! Now it springs up; do you not perceive it? I am making a way in the desert and streams in the wasteland ~Isaiah 43:19 

So here we are again, at the crossroads. If it’s not one thing, it’s another. I suppose the balance of life is such that where there is abundance in one area, there is an echoing void of equal proportion in another area. Perhaps it’s meant to keep us grateful, searching, striving for excellence. For me, it does all of those; but it also fuels my characteristic impatience.

Ever get that feeling in your gut when you know something significant in your life is on the edge of massive and positive change? You feel it so strongly that you can almost touch it, almost taste it, your adrenaline rushes when you feel the wind of change? And yet you don’t really know where that change will come from? When you look around you, as far as your eye can see, the only thing responding to the wind of change is your goose-bumped arm? Everything else is perfectly still?

Well, that’s where I’m standing.

I wonder whether there’s something I must DO to set that change in motion and bring it into my reality. Well, the still small voice is staying to me “Be still. Wait. It’s not yet time”. And because my human nature is stubborn to a fault, I want to know why it feels so close that I can taste it…if it’s not yet time. So it turns out that I am meant to be learning through practice to be content with my present space, while also looking ahead for the new thing that is in the making. That requires patience. Ironic, because I’ve been known to often say that patience, in my opinion is an overrated virtue -and I do mean it.

Yet, apparently there is something I’m building in the present space, which will prepare me for what is coming. I find it difficult to see that and be patient, when everything in my psyche says that I have outgrown it. To my disgruntled eye, the landscape has all the picturesque beauty of a wasteland. And yet there’s a reason I am here.