It’s normal for caring people, when their care is extended too far for too long, to experience fatigue, and most disconcertingly, it’s encountered through waning empathy.
And it’s a shock. Anyone who prides themselves on the capacity to empathise, when that empathy ebbs away, it can feel like one of the deepest crises of self possible.
Yet here is a paradox; we can’t go further on in our empathy of caring without having come to one of these precipices.
Like I was reminded today—thanks SH—we don’t feel resilient amid the battle, we only feel it post battle. But resilience comes in the struggle, even though we hate every part of it.
Restoring empathy in compassion fatigue is pretty simple in theory, but much harder in practice, though are not impossible, especially when we understand and embrace the theory.
The thing that has always reconnected me with my empathy, to ward against compassion fatigue, has been to get in touch with how much empathy I NEED.
For me—within the realm of faith—this is about FEELING God’s empathy for me; the depth of divine love for a sojourner who’s lost his way temporarily, not through misadventure as much as through burnout, not flippantly or carelessly but through hyperdiligence.
Compassion fatigue is a style of burnout that leaves our spirit withered, dry, and vulnerable to all kinds of attacks. It is the customary default to judge ourselves for an apparent hardness of heart. But the questioning person will always ask why.
Why did I become so jaded? And why does it bother me. (If it didn’t bother you, that would be the real problem.)
Another question: why doesn’t this person or situation seem as important as it once would have been?
These are crucial questions. Questions like these are curious questions, not judging questions.
The moment we hear someone tell us that it was good intent and not bad intent that got us into this situation, we should begin to judge ourselves less, and then receive a portion of empathy towards ourselves.
What is it like to receive this empathy toward ourselves?
It’s seeing how much we’re worthy of it. It’s seeing how much of ourselves we’ve poured out in love for others. That’s got to mean something, right? It’s accepting what we did for the best was our best, and nobody could’ve asked anything more of us.
Do you get the picture? It’s seeing all the things of truth that testify in our defence.
I can tell you, that God is for you and not against you, and even if you are against yourself, I can tell you that God is for you. Especially if you’ve poured out your life as a libation, there’s nothing more deserved than a recovery. To heal.
And in the mode of recovery, we find that we learn something about empathy for ourselves that we get to take away. None of that knowledge of the negative power of compassion fatigue is wasted. The very experience of compassion fatigue is itself a life experience, and once we’ve experienced it, we are less likely to repeat the dose.
So restoring empathy in compassion fatigue is a journey, and it can be a blessed one at that.
Just because you don’t feel the empathy at present doesn’t mean it’s gone forever. It’s likely that you’re about to learn a deeper empathy than you’ve ever had. That’s a gift, but not without pain, so receive empathy for yourself.
Photo by Gabrielle Claro on Unsplash
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