Do you hurt when others hurt? Do you feel sympathy and concern for the misfortunes and suffering of others? Are you compelled to use your gifts to help lift others and clear a path for healing and opportunity? You are compassionate. Your ability to show compassion for other beings allows you to care for others and to be cared for when your turn comes around. But compassion is not drawn from an endless well. It is possible to give so much that your well runs dry and you experience, at best, compassion fatigue and, at worst, the loss of your well-being and potentially your life. Rest and rejuvenation can prop you back up, but if you do not turn your compassion toward yourself, you will likely be drawn into the same cycle of giving to exhaustion. Filling yourself first and giving of the excess is often the opposite of what we are taught, to provide first and exist on what is left. Cultivating and practicing unconditional compassion for yourself can disrupt this pattern and ultimately protect your mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual health by shoring you up first. You can then freely and joyously give what remains.
Guest: Steckley Lee
The daughter of artists Steckley Lee, grew up surrounded by artists and creators in central Florida. Her plan to become an artist and herbalist changed course during the Bush-Cheney years when civil rights violations in her home state led her to enroll in law school to become a human rights attorney. In law school, she joined the
Progressive National Lawyers Guild, committed to protecting people over profits, collaborating with activists to resist neoliberalism and war, and fighting for the rights of disabled people, queer people, and people of color. She practiced as a public defender, prisoner-rights attorney, and defense attorney for parents accused of abuse and neglect. After a near-death experience and the birth of her three children, Steckley has shifted her focus to caregiving. This has grown with her children into a multigenerational art collective called Aries Makers that uses creativity to foster community-building, reciprocity, and a thriving life.