So thank you. So we come to the last of these five talks on attunement. And so the the acronym touch, there's thinking, thinking well thinking carefully about the suffering we encounter. Because the attunement we're talking about is the attunement that allows a meaningful importance, effective compassion, healthy compassion, to come forth into our care for the world. So before we're ready for compassion, we want to be attuned to the suffering, and that can take some reflection and thinking, we want to be open to it, willing to experience it. And this willingness is openness to it is a profound thing, because it's part of the movement towards freedom, freedom from resistance, freedom from picking things up freedom from blocking or become becoming the console free work and open window and everything can pass through, without touching the window without affecting the window, breaking the glass. Being upright, stable, strong, undefeated, uncollapse, just fully present, not assertive, not withdrawing, but a strong sense of presence. For with suffering, were encountering. And then communicating with people to really have been conversation with them and find out better what's going on, don't assume we know, don't assume we know what's needed. But to find out, be in communication, get the information. And then today, the age of touch, is help. Important part of, of compassion is to help to do something to alleviate the suffering in oneself and others and the whole world. And, but as a kind of building block to become compassionate and to real compassionate action. The help that I'm going to talk about today is a little bit more maybe more modest, or a stepping stone towards more more full, compassionate action. To to help, you want to be able to ask the question, what is helpful here, what is beneficial, and, and in all directions? What is beneficial for oneself. Because if we leave ourselves too much out of the equation, then we will, we can actually cause harm to ourselves and to others, if we're not careful, being careful attention to our motivations, our emotions, our feelings, or reactions of situation, and just feel like we're obligated to help someone with and we're supposed to be altruistic and not care for ourselves at all. We actually can be so disconnected from ourselves, that inadvertedly unhelpful things will come out of us we say things we express things we, we feel kind of we actually discover where maybe feel a another's anger and trying to help someone because we don't really want to, but we feel like we should. And so, what is helpful for ourselves in this situation. And, and this, we know really questioning ourselves is very important also, because with compassionate action, some people will live under rules of obligation, and duty and shoulds that are kind of authoritarian kind of override any careful attention and can exhaust people, part of the compassion fatigue can sometimes come from the sense of obligation that I have to do this, I have to do this. And so to really question that is what is beneficial here for me. And because, when I'm in benefit, especially spiritually benefited dharmic ly benefited and become settled and peaceful and calm and have a nice presence, then, not only can we act better, but the action that we do conveys something important. Many times the medium is the message, if we do things, because we're helping someone because we're anxious, and we're trying to, you know, assuage our fear motivated by fear, that will have a very different message to people, than if we are calm and subtle, and we don't act from fear, but we act with great energy, great passion or something. But we're calm and settled and present, and clearly kind of connected to the person we're doing it in a way that we can't be, if we're being motivated by fear. And by what is helpful for oneself is to check in with oneself. And, and understand what motivates us to be helpful. Because if we're motivating, motivated to help others, because we're not really caring for them, but if we really look carefully, we're just trying to get comfortable for ourselves, we want to create a nice identity for ourselves, we want to be able to show the world that we're a good person, and, and we're more driven by that than we are by helping the other people. And all those other kind of those kinds of motivations for ourselves are not spiritually beneficial, not dharmic ly beneficial, and actually can cause kind of long term harm sometimes even. But so to really check in what is really helpful. And the more we practice, the more we can answer that question. And in some ways, it's really deep, are really full are concerned for our long term happiness and welfare, not the short term, just making yourself comfortable. And so with that as a reference point, then we can ask what is helpful for the other person? Remember, we're talking about being attuned to the people, and, and what, and what is helpful for the other person is important thing to question and not bring the wrong kind of help. Some people want to be left alone, they want to figure things out themselves, they just want a companion, they some people just want to be seen and known in their struggles, but they don't necessarily want someone to come to support them and aid them and fix the problems for them. So what is supportive for others, and occasionally, people who do want to get help from other people, that's not actually spiritually helpful for them. Maybe it represents some way of always being kind of helpless and looking to others to be the Savior. And so at some point, we want to stop being the savior. Because people need to grow up, people need to learn how to stand their own two feet. And to always come to the rescue is not really beneficial for others, to be uncaring is not beneficial, but to be caring and allow someone to grow up is, is good. And this other on one hand, we want to ask what's beneficial for ourselves, what's beneficial for others. And this, in this category of help here, is also to ask it because we're trying to be attuned. What form of help is attuned to myself, and is attuned to the person there. So someone is having some challenge, say that they are late or late to go someplace, and maybe they have a flat tire, and they don't know how to fix a flat tire. So on the surface, just seems like what's best is to help them, you know, replaced, put in the spear for them, because maybe you know how to do it. And that's nice, but maybe you don't have a clue how to put on a spare tire. So it's not helpful to go and help them with a tire then what might be helpful is to call someone who does find some other kinds of help. And, or maybe there's, you know, the person may be configured out, there's no place to call, maybe there's no cell phone, you're in the desert, you can't help with it. So what's attuned with what you can do, and what this need is, and maybe what you can do is bringing them water, you realize they've been struggling for some time, it's hot in the desert. And so you bring them water, maybe you bring them some food to eat and say here, take a break and let's let's maybe you'll use like you need to drink and be settled a little bit and we can even go back to it then. So that's an example of kind of, what can I do that's appropriate for me. And sometimes like someone who's a, you know, completely devoted introvert. Sometimes it's just sitting on the park bench or something and accompanying them someplace to where they're challenged. And it doesn't you know, not to be involved so much in conversation and fixing but just accompanying. You have the ability to be calm and centered and present. And, and I've gotten just to sit with people You know, and be quiet and let them do what they needed to do. But they felt that there was some support quietly in the room.
Or if you're a devoted extrovert and you love to sing, it might be that singing a song for the person is the right thing. And I don't think that anybody wants me to sing exactly. But, but people who are saying I knew I knew a chaplain, who was in the hospital with someone who was dying. In the emergency room, it was kind of a tragic death. And the person was quite upset, discouraged, angry, and had turned into turned her face into the wall, and was unresponsive to anybody coming. And through the chaplain just started singing a song. And in the course of the song, the person kind of softened and opened up and turned around and then started to engage the chaplain. And so what is the right way? What's what's attuned to oneself what, what we can bring? How do we help this person? How do we help the person for what they can receive, some people are not able to help to receive what seems like the logical obvious help, that should be done. They feel it's too they feel it, they feel put put upon they feel, it's too assertive people have entered their space too much. They feel like they know because then they feel obligated. Some cultures is a deep sense of obligation that comes with helping people the receiving help. And so it's difficult to kind of step into their, in their zone. So to that's where the communication is important. What will this person, what does this person want to receive? What can they receive what when their hand? And so, you know, so what kind of communication what kind, maybe some people you know, as I said, they just, they just want to be quiet together with someone else. Someone else wants to join in a song. If someone came to me in the emergency and wanting to care for me, it chances are expecting me to sing a song with them is not really going to be, you know, be so helpful for me. So this question of being attuned, it means questioning and considering all the factors that should be that are going there in place to know how to help what would be helpful here, given oneself given the other person given the situation, with the assumption, and this, I think is a really good assumption to go by, is that there are any given time, there are many ways to help, not just one. And if we are rushing into that one way that we think is the right way, then there's a good chance we're going to miss what the situation is really about the total situation that includes oneself. So touch, think open, openness, uprightness communication, and help all places where you do it, we do the work of attunement of great. So. So thank you, and I will be away. Next week. I'm back at the IRC for a retreat. And actually for the next two weeks, and next next week, Don Neil will come and wonderful new teacher coming up here at IMC and and then the following week, it's going to be the Akoto Komodo Komodo Conlin, who taught for us last fall, and also a wonderful upcoming teacher here at IMC. And then I'll be back in after those two weeks, for one more week before I get ready and go and my month long retreat them doing a self retreat for the month of June. So thank you, and you'll be in good hands with the teachers that are coming and please support them in their, their capacity to be a teacher and appreciate them and, and I'll see you in a couple of weeks. Thank you very much. And that point, I want to continue on this theme. So this idea of compassion is an ongoing theme. And it's also an ongoing way of dealing with the theme so far this year of how to be with challenges. And now we're kind of covering the area of compassion in that field. So we've been doing that for a few weeks and will continue for a while. Thank you
