F eel the heart behind your hurt
So how can we find balance? Dr Hill suggests a practice called Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT) to help you stay engaged with caring, without burning out. She advises:
1 AVOID AVOIDING It is normal to want to avoid pain, but Dr Hill believes complete avoidance often makes things worse. ‘Avoidance can lead to feelings of loneliness, guilt, or secondary problems, such as having to deal with that hangover you created, or the work you missed while you were avoiding life. The first step out of feeling terrible is to stop trying to avoid feeling terrible.’
Dr Hill suggests we face up to situations, however distressing, and then take action towards what we care about, no matter how small or how relevant to the source of our distress. We cannot control how humans in other places and situations behave towards each other, but we can control our own behaviour, so we should focus on that.
2 DON’T FEAR COMPASSION Dr Hill recognises that many of us fear that if we allow ourselves to feel the pain of others, we will be overwhelmed by it. ‘Compassion doesn’t mean you give up or become engulfed in pain or pity,’ she says. ‘Compassion involves turning toward suffering, offering a caring heart, and making moves to alleviate it – when possible’.
Our response to suffering is one of caring, so we should channel this by practising compassion towards ourselves and others, at those times that we feel helpless as regards the ‘bigger picture’.
3 SPEND TIME WITH YOUR FEELINGS It may involve discomfort, but Dr Hill encourages us to ‘look for values where it hurts most’. Look for the values that are behind the emotions that you feel during periods of distress. ‘Anger, fear, regret, and sadness are some of our least favourite emotions,’ she says, ‘yet these feelings often point to what you care most about. Spend some time with your hurt to look for the values that are driving it. That care will be your motivation for action.’
4 CARRY ON WITH COMMITTED ACTION When you uncover what Dr Hill calls the ‘heart behind your hurt’, act on it. For example, if you care about peace and conflict resolution, practise perspective-taking (seeing a situation from another’s point of view) and encourage this in your family, too. This may not bring about world peace but, by acting on your values, you are playing your part in a movement towards it.
‘There is a lot we cannot control right now,’ says Dr Hill, ‘but when you take control of your actions by acting on your values, you will discover you do have the power to carry on, calm or not.’