Healing Trauma 4

I will begin by quoting here the entire text of the prayer of St. Francis.  I am not going to copy and paste it off Wikipedia.  This is an incredibly meaningful text and I want to meditate on each word while typing it out for us, Gentle Reader.  If I get any of it wrong, please understand that my memory isn't always as flawless as I think it is.

Lord, make me an instrument of thy peace:
Where there is hatred let me sow love,
where there is injury pardon,
where there is doubt, faith,
where there is despair, hope,
where there is darkness, light.
where there is sadness, joy.
O Divine Master,
Grant that I should not seek to be consoled,
so much as to be consoled,
to be understood,
as to understand,
to be loved,
as to love.
For it is in pardoning that we are pardoned,
in giving that we receive,
and in dying that we are born to eternal life.

So, what do these words have to do with healing trauma?  These words say absolutely nothing about caring for or nurturing the wounded self.  It is all focussed on forgetting self and focussing on the other.

This week, on the CBC Radio One, I am listening to a series on workplace burnout.  In many fields, notably in my own profession, this is a major occupational hazard.  I have at times encountered in myself early warning signs of burnout.  I seem to have succeeded so far in avoiding any major impact.  This isn't to say that I'm immune.  No one is, really.

Still, referring back to the Prayer of St. Francis of Assisi.  These words would be considered by any care or support professional a recipe for burnout.  There is nothing mentioned about caring for oneself.  And yet, throughout the prayer, and at the very heart of the Christian ethos, it is all about caring for others.  There is nothing about me.  It's all for you.

I am not going to deny here the importance of good self-care, especially when we are actively caring for others: the importance of sufficient downtime, getting enough sleep and rest, exercise, recreational time, cultivating good and healthy relationships with friends, family and other loved ones.

None of this is mentioned in the Prayer of St. Francis.

To validate and empower those words, without turning them into a maudlin caricature of sanctity and holiness, one has to know where to stop.  Or when to pause.  Especially when, like you and me, Gentle Reader, you are a casualty of such a psychopathic culture of narcissism, greed and selfishness as the one we are living in.

We are not naturally equipped to be empathetic, kind or generous.  We need to learn this.  Is it any wonder that burnout happens so easily for many of us?  We are moral and ethical weaklings.  We have been so spiritually disempowered and disembowelled by living like self-absorbed little consumers that there is very little incentive and absolutely no infrastructure in our society that nurtures and encourages living as generous beings.

We need to address this, especially given how caring for others often is even of greater therapeutic value to the caregiver than to the recipient.

Learning, being willing to learn, how to love and care for others, in my opinion and through my own experience of recovery from trauma, is an essential core part of healing.  It is not the only part, self-care is vitally important and for a while self-care will need to occupy the front seat.   But eventually we have to move beyond ourselves to meaningfully touch the lives of others.  We are a highly social animal, and we have really lost some of the most essential moorings of our humanity.

Where there is hatred, let us sow love, while reaffirming that we ourselves are loved and loveable;
Where there is injury pardon, not forgiving the offence but forgiving the offender and then forgiving ourselves.

Where there is doubt, faith, faith in God, or however we wish to name as our highest good, faith in others, no matter how disappointed we are, and faith in ourselves.

Sadness, joy.  I think this is the real kicker.  There is something about caring for others with an attitude of joy and humour that lightens the load for us and delivers stellar care to them while protecting us from burnout.

Where there is despair, hope, even hoping in what we cannot possibly know or imagine, but to know that we will get through this mess, we will come out of this darkness.

Where there is darkness, light.  Really, if we are already doing the other stuff, we are going to be full of light and this can only help and inspire others.

Grant that I should not seek so much to be consoled as to console.  There is something about offering comfort while our own hearts are breaking that helps begin and even speed our own process of healing.

To be understood as to understand.  I don't think any of us can realistically expect that anyone but God can fully and truly understand us.  When we begin to seek to understand others we come by extension to understand, know, and accept ourselves better.

To be loved as to love.  I find that when I open myself to the possibility of loving others that this also seems to fill my own need to be loved.

And this is why it is in pardoning that we are pardoned, in giving that we receive, and in dying that we are born to eternal life.

Because our culture of selfishness has left us very weak and soft, I would recommend learning to live this prayer through small steps.  Very small steps.

We are pathetic.  But not entirely beyond hope.