If you’ve ever listened to Pema Chodron, the well-known Tibetan Buddhist, she often talks about true enlightenment as the move toward pain rather than away from it. To be truly compassionate, we need to feel our pain so we can understand the pain of others. 

“On the path of the warrior-bodhisattva [enlightened one], the path goes down, not up, as if the mountain pointed towards the earth instead of the sky. Instead of transcending the suffering of all creatures, we move towards turbulence and doubt however we can.”

Now with the shelter-in-place mandate all over the country, and even globally, due to concerns over the spread of COVID-19, what better time than now to practice? We can move into our uncertainty and pain about the future with curiosity, patience, and loving kindness. We can accept that we are scared, feel powerless, don’t know what to do, how to proceed, or what is coming next, and settle into that without judgment, without fear, without needing to change anything or find a solution. In exploring our insecurities and fears, we can move closer to the tenderness in our own hearts, to a clearer, more honest understanding of how we feel and how many others might be feeling as well.  

And it takes tremendous courage to be willing to face our fears with such candor without censorship. The reward is that we create loving kindness for ourselves and others. Without loving kindness for ourselves, it is virtually impossible to feel it for anyone else. We can get on the path toward compassion by first treating ourselves with loving kindness, then extend that kindness to others. We can face our fears without having to change anything, like standing on the edge of a precipice. What comes next? No one knows. But we are in this together, and there is comfort in that.

Meeting yourself where you are is true grace and acceptance. There is something so beautiful and honest about this type of courage. It is compassion in action, for when you come from this place within yourself, you can meet that same authentic, loving place in others.  

Try perceiving each moment with presence of mind. In doing so, you can transform your fears into something greater. We can be honest and admit we don’t know what we’re doing, where we are going next, and, if we are truly honest, we can admit to ourselves that we really never do. Not now, not ever. And then we begin the journey toward true honesty and wisdom.