Latest / Wellness in Today's World / Ep. 27: “From Self-Care to We-Care": Rethinking Compassion and Boundaries

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Ep. 27: “From Self-Care to We-Care": Rethinking Compassion and Boundaries · Wellness in Today's World

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Welcome to "Wellness in Today's World," the podcast where we talk about wellness,
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psychology, and everything in between.
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I'm your host, Debra Kawahara,
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and with every episode, we have thoughtful conversations about what it means
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to live well. Today we're joined by Dr.
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Jordan Quaglia,
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a leading researcher and speaker in compassion science and the founder of We-Care,
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an innovative framework that reimagines how we practice care from inner care
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with collective care. His innovative framework bridges neuroscience,
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psychology, and real-world practice to help us move beyond the focus
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of self-care to
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a more integrated, sustainable approach to health and well-being.
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Jordan offers a powerful perspective that true wellness is
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not just about focusing on ourselves,
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nor focusing on others, but truly integrating both
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simultaneously. With that, I'd like to welcome Jordan to the podcast.
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Well, thanks so much, Debra, and I'm honored to be here and really looking forward
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to this conversation with you.
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Wonderful. So let's get started!
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You know, I like to start with your journey ~ as you kind
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of transverse to the concept of We-Care.
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Yeah, I think my journey to We-Care really began long before I had a name
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for the concept. I was a graduate student studying to become a psychotherapist,
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and I heard a lot of this other term,
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which was "healthy boundaries." I was hearing it in my classroom,
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I was hearing it amongst my peers,
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I was being told how important healthy boundaries were to being a good therapist.
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And increasingly I was hearing it in other places too throughout society.
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I think it's actually just grown more important since that time I
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was a graduate student. And despite all of this attention on healthy boundaries,
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I couldn't get anyone to give me a clear answer about what healthy boundaries really
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were, or more importantly, how to go about cultivating them in a sustainable way.
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And so I was already working in a research lab at the time,
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and I went to the scientific literature,
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a place where I was used to finding sort of definitional clarity.
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And I found only scattered pieces of a puzzle.
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And ~ that made me really interested in the possibility of getting clarity about
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what healthy boundaries were. So I pivoted my career away from becoming
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a therapist toward research in psychology and neuroscience.
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I didn't directly focus on boundaries right away,
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but ~ I sort of kept that question alive in my mind for many years.
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And it wasn't until I returned as a faculty member to
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Naropa University, where I'm a professor now,
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that I was invited to be part of our compassion initiative and teach as part
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of our compassion training program.
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We have an eight-week secular compassion training program called WELCOME.
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One day as I was preparing for class,
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I was looking at my notes, and it's hard to describe moments like this,
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but I sort of had this insight,
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you know, ~ it was an insight,
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where all of my thoughts about compassion
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and care and boundaries I read in my book sort of rotated in my mind.
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And I felt like I was looking at the puzzle from a totally different perspective
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now. And from that new vantage point,
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I could see that the missing puzzle piece was right in front of me all along.
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And in fact, it was sort of baked into the center,
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or there was an assumption in the center of compassion science and care science that
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I realized needed to be challenged or
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reconsidered. And so at that point I noticed or I recognized that
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in order to understand what healthy boundaries were,
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I first had to solve this bigger puzzle.
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And I now call that puzzle We-Care.
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And that's what led to the book.
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Wonderful. When I read your book,
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I thought it was, from a systems thinking perspective,
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it makes so much sense that it doesn't need to be either-or approach;
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that I think you're trying to say there should be this integrated "both-and"
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approach to how we think about care.
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I wanted you to talk more about We-Care and what that means in simple terms
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for our listeners.
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Absolutely. Yeah. Thank you. Yeah,
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it's really ~ aligned with what you shared already.
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So We-Care is really a more interconnected approach to caring throughout our lives.
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So rather than seeing self-care and caring for others as two different things;
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you know, sometimes we're practicing self-care,
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sometimes we're practicing care for others.
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I think a more natural perspective that's more aligned with the research
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is to see them as interconnected parts of a more holistic system of care.
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It's possible for us from that perspective,
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then, to ~ practice self-care and care for others in more integrated forms.
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A metaphor I like to use is that of breathing.
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We can mentally divide the breath into in-breath and out-breath,
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but fundamentally we understand that they're parts of one interconnected system.
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They're both parts of breathing,
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and they're both important for sustaining our vitality.
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In a similar way, ~ I think we can mentally divide care into self-care
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and care for others, but both are essential parts of ~ care throughout our life.
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The metaphor sort of breaks down because,
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unlike breathing, we can't breathe in and breathe out simultaneously,
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but we can practice care for ourselves
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Okay.
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and care for others simultaneously.
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So, We-Care is really about that kind of "both-and" practice.
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Being trained as a psychologist,
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in terms of my training, it was more Western because I trained here
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in the United States; I started thinking about cultural orientations,
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right? That Western culture tends to be more individualistic,
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whereas Eastern cultures tend to be,
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and these are broad generalizations,
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but more group-oriented,
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harmony, things like that. It made me think,
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because I think one of your premises is that if you only focus on one side
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or the other, that is not as mutually beneficial as if you do both.
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So I wanted you to talk a little bit because I know you do compassion science
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and you do this compassion training.
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I really wanted to understand how both of those orientations
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are integrated into this We-Care.
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Yeah, thanks so much.
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Yeah, the the fundamental insight that's at the center of We-Care,
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to clarify that, is that when we practice care either for ourselves or others
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in a way that's divided; and what I mean by that is that we lose sight
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of the other orientation. So when we're practicing,
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when we're being other-oriented,
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when we're caring for others, but then we lose sight of our own needs
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in the process, we lose ourselves.
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People say they lose themselves in that kind of other-care.
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That's usually not a desirable state to be in.
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People report feeling really stressed out by that and afterwards needing more
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recovery time, that kind of thing,
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right? At the same time, when we practice self-care in a way that's divided,
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we feel guilty for practicing self-care.
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We forget about its interconnection with our care for others.
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So We-Care is really about inhabiting this healthy middle zone where we're awake to
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caring for others as we take care of ourselves,
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and we're awake to caring for ourselves as we care for others.
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And we're not losing sight of one side of that spectrum or the other.
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And so that healthy zone is really where we find the healthiest expressions of care.
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And it's at those extreme ends of care where we find most of the harm
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of care tends to occur. So, like I said,
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you know, we could care for others and lose sight of our own needs
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and end up burnt out.
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Or we could care for ourselves in a divided way and end up feeling
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all of this second-guessing and inner conflict as we're doing that in ways that sort
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of undermine the quality of our self-care as we're doing it.
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To your second point, which is about cultural orientations,
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I love this question. I've never been asked this publicly,
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and I thought deeply about it as I was writing the book.
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It didn't really make it into the book.
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I think it's tempting to imagine that individualist cultures
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are more self-oriented in terms of care,
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and collectivist cultures are more other-oriented in terms of care.
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I think that it's more complicated and nuanced than that.
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I think you would agree about that.
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Yep.
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I think there's
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different expressions of self-care in a collectivist culture than
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an individualist culture, and different expressions of other-care.
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And there's different ways that this
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dilemma in care shows up. And so it's not that we don't have this kind
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of struggle in a collectivist culture,
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or that...
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Yeah.
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because they're being other-oriented,
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they need to be more self-oriented.
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I think that it's more nuanced and more situational and contextual than that.
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At the same time, I do think that there are important differences
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in how this tension shows up and how people experience this kind of inner conflict.
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And yet the good news is I think that ~ We-Care applies across both cultures
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in terms of its instructive value.
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If we're leaning in one direction,
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it's important to keep the other in mind.
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And if we lose sight of that other orientation,
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that's when we're getting into territory that's more stressful and more likely
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to undermine our personal well-being or our relational well-being over time.
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I think it's because oftentimes trying to make sure that that nuance that
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you talked about, that it doesn't mean that you're not bringing in that other piece
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to how you then respond. I'm thinking of more,
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Asian culture, and it's not like you just are selfless.
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Yet in your responses to things,
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even though there's a group orientation preference,
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I guess I would say.
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Yeah.
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In the book you talk about the superhero and hurt aspects,
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as we maybe automatically respond to a situation.
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And I know you gave a couple of situations in the book
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when you were in Thailand, the Colorado shooting,
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and how this may tap into one or the other of that.
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So I wanted you to talk a little bit about that.
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Yeah, thank you. I read about the superhero and the
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hurt as kind of two archetypes in some sense for thinking about ways that
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our care gets really divided. And that tends
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Mm-hmm.
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to happen when we're in very stressful situations or there's some kind of emergency,
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maybe even that's unfolding. Although everyday life can sometimes feel like this
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too, you know, it gets very stressful and there's lots of things that we're
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balancing.
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My book, even though the central tension in care that I write about
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is this dividing line between self-care and care for others and
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the importance of moving from an either-or to a both-and in that practice,
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there are two other dividing lines that I write about.
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And one is about, you know, care as feeling;
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so feeling warm-hearted or feeling compassion or feeling empathy,
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and care as action, which is, you know,
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taking action, fixing,
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solving problems, that kind of thing.
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That tension shows up in care in our lives.
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And then the third one is, sometimes I talk about it as vulnerability and strength.
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Those three dividing lines, they can co-occur.
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And that's what tends to happen in the superhero and the hurt response.
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So when we're in an emergency situation,
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some of us will feel very other-oriented,
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very action-oriented, and very strong
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in that situation. We want to rush into the fire and rescue whoever's in there.
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Others of us, when
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we're confronted with an emergency situation,
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and this could happen to any of us,
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it just depends maybe on the moment and the kind of situation,
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but we may find ourselves more like,
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"Okay, I'm going to retreat into myself.
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I'm going to crawl under a rock and feel the complexity of the situation,
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feel the depth of my feelings and how hard this is.
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And get in touch with my vulnerable side in some sense,
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because the situation's really scaring me and I need to take care of myself." So,
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extreme situations can really polarize our care along all three
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of those dividing lines. And that's
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Mm-hmm.
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really what I meant by the superhero and the hurt.
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And yeah, I've experienced these very directly.
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So there was a mass shooting here in Boulder,
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Colorado.
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And I wrote about it in my book that I felt both of these responses arising within
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me shortly after that mess shooting.
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Now I wasn't there, I'll mention that,
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but it just occurred down the street from where my apartment is.
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And it was important for me to recognize that there was a part of me that wanted
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to go and do something immediately and take urgent action and help out.
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And there was a part of me that just wanted to retreat to my bedroom
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and do a Netflix binge and just kind of ignore the world for a little while.
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I prefer and I advocate for finding a healthy middle between those care responses
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because both of them involve dividing our heart,
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in a way. And it's possible for us in the moment to stay with both feelings long
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enough to find some kind of harmony between them.
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And in this case, what I did is I ended up an op-ed for our local newspaper about
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how
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compassion training and compassion science could be a useful lens
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for relating to the coming days and months of that tragedy.
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You know, we've been talking about compassion,
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and I know that you do research in that area.
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You also train people. One of the things that's talked about a lot is empathy.
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I wanted you to kind of for our listeners,
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are those the same or are they different in terms of how you're using it?
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And how can that inform us in terms of this We-Care?
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Yeah, I think that another way of understanding the superhero and
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the hurt is through that lens.
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So what is really driving both the superhero and the hurt in that situation
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is more of an empathy response.
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And so empathy and compassion are seen as distinct experiences.
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And there's lots of good research on this by Tania Singer and others,
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demonstrating that there's even distinct neural correlates
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for empathy and compassion. Empathy tends to be a more automatic response.
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So, when something traumatic is happening to other people or very stressful
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is happening, or we notice that someone's in a bad place,
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a dysregulated place, our heart goes out to them naturally.
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The research shows we simulate part of their experience in our own body and mind,
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and we end up taking on some of the qualities of that stress response ourselves.
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So that tends to be a more automatic response.
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Compassion starts with that same response.
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And so empathy is part of the compassion response.
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But I like to say that compassion sort of completes the loop that empathy
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is meant to start and that often gets stalled out with some kind
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of inner conflict and confusion.
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A lot of times when we're feeling empathy,
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especially for situations like we're seeing in the news,
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like I was seeing with this mass shooting unfolding,
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we feel mixed about it because we
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don't know what we want to do in relation to that situation,
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or it's affecting people halfway around the world,
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or there's no clear pathway for taking action yet.
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Compassion allows us to transform that empathy response into a more conscious
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and regulated state. And the fundamental distinction that is written about
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is that empathy is more about feeling with others,
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and compassion is more about feeling
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for others. That's a simple kind of way of understanding it.
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Now, how do you actually go about that?
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Well, in the moment, you know,
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we do this in in our compassion training.
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In the moment that you're in that empathic distress response,
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which is a natural response, and we don't want to reject that experience.
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It's going to happen even if we tried to reject it.
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You can spark compassion. And so I write about something that I call "the compassion
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spark," which is
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remembering something that's related to our intention to care.
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For many people in our training program,
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it's a pet; like they'll think about their puppy or they'll think about their
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cat or something like that, which I think is a wonderful compassion spark.
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Mm-hmm. Uh-huh.
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Because what
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that does is it sparks this affiliative emotion.
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And if we do that, we can bring about this feeling for quality that helps
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us to buffer against some of the empathic distress.
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And then have a more conscious response to the situation.
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What I hear underneath that is intention.
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Hmm, yes, yes.
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I think it's a very astute observation.
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You know, why is it that compassion is a more regulated response?
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It comes down to intention. If we look at the mechanisms that underlie regulation,
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regulation comes down to so much having an intention.
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So when we actually allow ourselves when we're feeling empathic distress
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to remember an intention that we have,
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which is maybe to be caring toward ourselves even in that moment,
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Mm-hmm.
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that is already the beginning of regulation.
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And I think even better if we can feel,
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you know, that we have an intention to care for ourselves and somehow respond
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to this situation, maybe even just,
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you know, by being kinder to the people around us.
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And don't we need kindness in the world these days right now?
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Yes. Yeah.
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So, you know, one of the things that I'm interested in,
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and this is kind of my nerdy side,
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is the science around this, because I know you've been studying this,
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and is there any mechanisms that make us maybe
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go towards one side or the other more?
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Yeah, I think in general, you know,
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it is a skill-based thing to transform empathy into compassion.
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That's why we emphasize compassion training.
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You know, we have this eight-week
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One.
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training program. And it really is something that that feeling aspect is
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one of the hardest aspects for people to get in touch with.
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When they're in the midst
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Yeah.
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of empathic distress, it's really difficult to imagine transforming that experience.
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It feels very dysregulating.
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You know, I think our habitual tendencies are to transform that feeling through
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taking some kind of action to help.
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Mm-hmm.
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But if we're in the midst of a situation where helping isn't possible,
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or maybe we don't know the people,
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it wouldn't be appropriate, or something like that,
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there are other skills that we can learn to feel resourced in that moment
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and to extend our heart, to wish well for the people in that situation,
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even if we can't
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consciously do something about it in the moment,
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or, you know, ~ behaviorally do something about it in the moment.
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We can consciously do something about it in the moment by remembering that intention
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and well-wishing even from a distance.
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Mm-hmm.
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Now, some people believe that that well-wishing actually serves their well-being.
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And I think that's a wonderful thing if people hold that view and want
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to send out those wishes of love and kindness to others.
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But even if we don't
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necessarily have that belief, cultivating that skill of wishing well
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for others in the midst of that empathic distress is something that's regulating
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in the moment and that is likely to help us care for others in our life
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who are around us, you know, in the near future.
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I think just one last thing I want to say is that self-compassion
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has become very popular as another strategy for relating with empathic distress.
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You know, there are lots of good studies showing that self-compassion training
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can be really helpful for people who are working in the helping professions,
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like nurses or therapists or
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Mm. Mm-hmm.
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social workers. But my research and the research of others suggests that
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if we're not working with that
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actual other-oriented response and to transform that other-oriented response through
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other-oriented compassion, we may be still engaging in what I would call
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a sort of half-hearted way with that situation.
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So we end up toggling back and forth.
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So we give, give, give at work,
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or we give, give, give to our clients,
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you know, in the hospital or setting or whatever.
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And then we sort of
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collapse into self-care and self-compassion later in the day,
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or maybe we do our self-compassion practice and it sort of partially restores
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our reserves. I think a more skillful and comprehensive
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and WeCare-oriented approach says we need to work to transform both
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our self-care into a more conscious practice that we,
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you know, do regularly, and our other-oriented care,
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it's helpful to transform it so it becomes less divided.
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So we're
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Mm-hmm.
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not just being other-oriented for hours at a time,
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but that we're remembering in the midst of our work day to self-attune.
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We're remembering to, you know,
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have that snack. We're remembering to stand up and walk and get that glass
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of water before we sit back down at our computer again.
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And so it's that kind of blending of self-care and care for others that We-Care
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is really focused on. And if we can maintain that discipline,
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then we don't become too divided in either direction.
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And so
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Mm-hmm.
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while I think that, you know, self-compassion and that movement toward training
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self-compassion is wonderful, the actual skill that we're talking about right
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now is about transforming that other-oriented response from something that's
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unconscious into a more conscious other-oriented response.
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And the wonderful thing about that is that we still get to be other-oriented.
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We don't have to turn our other-oriented nature into a problem.
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It's actually wonderful to be a kind person and to be other-oriented.
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And so we just have to learn maybe to do that less in a habitual way and more
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in a sort of compassionate instead of empathic way.
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I guess what came to me is what you were talking about divided,
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dichotomous, compartmentalized is what I was thinking.
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It's like, "Okay, this time of the day I'm gonna be other-oriented.
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This time of the day I can go home and take care of myself." And you're saying,
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no, being more aware,
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more active in both
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being addressed at the same time.
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I really like that because oftentimes either extreme,
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one may lead to burnout, the other may lead to difficulties in your relationships.
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And so I think you're trying to say getting a more balanced
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and grounded place that both are being taken care of
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at the same time.
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That's right. And we can still do...
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I use this phrase when I'm teaching about We-Care:
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"Emphasize, don't polarize, your care." So we can still emphasize others when
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we need to, or emphasize ourselves when we need to,
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without polarizing our care. So care polarization occurs when we lose sight
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of the other orientation. And that's when we see a lot of the symptoms that you're
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talking about arise. You know,
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another one that
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other people can relate to is when you're in the midst of self-care,
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you know, you've made that time,
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you scheduled that time for self-care,
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but then you're in the midst of it and you can't stop thinking about,
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you know, how you're doing this instead of taking care of,
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you know, your friend who's going through a difficult time,
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or instead of doing that work task that's really important.
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And so that kind of inner conflict is also due to a kind of mental division
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of our care when we're thinking that our self-care time
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Is just for ourselves. This is one of the reasons why I think we need
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to change our language around care and why the book that I wrote
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is called "From Self-Care to We-Care," because really fundamentally,
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when we're caring for ourselves,
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we're caring for a we. You know,
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most of us
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Mm-hmm.
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are in other relationships that we really care about.
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And when we're
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caring for ourselves, we're aware on some level
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that doing that is resourcing us for others that we care about or for our
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job or for our family or whatever.
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But somehow the language around self-care makes us lose sight of that.
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We feel like, "I'm being selfish for taking care of myself," even though
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we know that it's actually good for everyone in our life if we're more resourced
24:10
and so on. So yeah, I think it's that kind of,
24:13
you know, inner conflict that's that's kind of needless sometimes
24:18
that comes about when we mentally divide our care.
24:21
And then of course it shows up in our behavior.
24:23
When we're being other-oriented,
24:25
we feel like we need to just be all-or-nothing about it.
24:28
Like, "I just need to care
24:28
Mm-hmm.
24:29
for this friend selflessly and forget about all of my needs in this moment,
24:33
even though I didn't have lunch today.
24:35
But here I am supporting them,
24:37
and I just have to keep supporting them." With We-Care,
24:39
it starts small. We want to
24:42
notice where are our biggest care blind spots,
24:45
you know, in one direction or the other.
24:46
And then begin with awareness to build back in the other orientation
24:51
and move toward that healthier middle zone.
24:54
I really like the example you gave because I think there are a lot
24:58
of people that you know when you're in that situation that somebody is,
25:03
like you were talking about, difficult situation kind of reaching out maybe
25:08
to ask for your support or your help,
25:11
but then maybe you're not in a place that you can really give that help
25:15
or support yourself. But that then what comes on is that guilt of...
25:21
"This is a good friend of mine.
25:22
This is my so-and-so. And I should be there for them.
25:27
If they are important to me, I should be there." And I guess what
25:31
I'm thinking is then it comes back to those healthy boundaries and We-Care,
25:36
those complicated situations. So I'm gonna have you talk about that
25:39
Ha ha ha.
25:40
because I think, you know, these are the quandaries that we
25:44
Yes.
25:44
find ourselves in.
25:46
Yeah. I really appreciate your framing there because what you're highlighting
25:50
is really the complexity of care in daily life.
25:53
I think that,
25:54
to a large degree, my book is just one big validation of the complexity
25:58
of care in daily life, you know?
25:59
I think that self-care and care for others,
26:01
that division oversimplifies our care.
26:05
And it doesn't speak to the interconnected nature that we all feel in daily life.
26:10
What you're speaking to in some sense is part of the We-Care practice,
26:14
is how do we sequence our care in moments like that?
26:18
And so part of healthy boundaries is recognizing,
26:21
you know, we can't be in two places at the same time,
26:24
but we can actually find, if we just raise our gaze a little bit,
26:28
this healthy middle zone where we recognize,
26:31
"Okay, I'm in the midst of self-care right now.
26:34
I'm really depleted. I just finished my work day.
26:37
My friend is calling me on the phone and my phone's buzzing.
26:40
And I know that they want me to answer so that they can vent to me
26:44
or something like that, because they're going through a hard time." And
26:47
we feel this tug in our heart.
26:49
You know, we feel this kind of tug-of-war.
26:50
So how do we resolve that? Well,
26:52
there's different ways from a We-Care perspective to resolve that tension.
26:56
One of the ways is that we can reframe the situation and say,
27:00
"I might be in a similar situation in the future where I'm calling them when they're
27:04
depleted. And so me answering the phone right now is actually good for both of us.
27:08
You know, it's going to support them now and it'll support me if I need their help
27:12
in the future." You know, that is one way of resolving it.
27:15
It's probably not the most ideal way in that moment because you're already depleted.
27:18
Another way, and this speaks to what you were saying,
27:21
is to do what I call "sequencing your care." And so you would recognize,
27:27
"I'm going to rest a little bit longer.
27:29
I know that right now I don't feel like I can offer them support and
27:32
I can't even imagine offering them support because I'm so depleted.
27:37
But at some
27:37
Yeah.
27:38
point in the near future, after I rest for a little while and maybe have a meal,
27:42
I'm gonna feel ready to call them and offer them that support.
27:46
And when I do, I'm gonna be in a more resourced place and I'm gonna offer more
27:50
effective support to them." And that kind of inner unity supports clearer action
27:56
in that moment.
27:57
We feel less divided internally.
27:59
And probably in the end, we're going to offer more effective support to our friend.
28:04
And they probably wouldn't want us to support them when we're
28:06
in that really depleted state to begin with.
28:08
So yeah, we lift our gaze and we think about what I call a third way,
28:12
which is a way beyond this kind of either-or framing of our care,
28:16
that we have to just do one or the other.
28:18
And there is a whole spectrum of possibilities.
28:21
We're just talking about two right now.
28:22
You know, we can unify our care,
28:24
we can sequence our care.
28:26
There's a whole lot of other possibilities I write about.
28:28
Yeah, I know that you write about strategies like blending,
28:32
sequencing,
28:33
Yes.
28:33
and things like that. So it's in the book if people wanna find
28:37
Yeah, yeah.
28:38
it. But I don't know if you wanna mention any other strategies that
28:42
you have for people because it is these dilemmas that I think are more difficult
28:47
to figure out. How do I integrate the two?
28:50
Yeah, this is real stuff. You know,
28:52
I think that all of us... If people are struggling with this,
28:55
if they're listening and they're struggling with,
28:57
feeling this kind of either-or around self-care or care for others
29:01
or this tension of setting a healthy boundary in a relationship,
29:04
you're not alone. Like, we're all struggling with this.
29:07
It's very
29:07
Yes.
29:08
difficult. And so just, again,
29:10
to embrace the complexity of that.
29:12
And one of the things that is really critical from a We-Care perspective
29:16
is creativity. So, you know, being willing to pause long enough to think about other
29:22
possibilities beyond the either-or.
29:25
I love this because, you know,
29:27
I identify as a creative and I've
29:29
in the past liked making different kinds of art or creative writing
29:32
or things like that. So for me,
29:33
embracing creativity and bringing that into my care is an ongoing practice.
29:38
But even if that's not something that you identify with,
29:42
this broader strategy of just pausing long enough to allow insight to arise,
29:48
like asking ourselves the question,
29:50
"Is there a way for myself to relate to this situation beyond just one
29:56
thing or the other?" And usually we do find a way.
30:00
And actually we usually find multiple ways.
30:03
And then it becomes kind of a practice of how do we know which of those ways
30:07
is the better way?
30:08
What I like about that is oftentimes,
30:12
you know, as a therapist, talking to clients about there isn't just
30:17
one or the other. Maybe there are multiple options that you have in front
30:21
of you and that maybe taking the time to see are there other options other than
30:27
the ones that automatically came up first,
30:30
you know, and thinking you only have those two choices.
30:34
You know,
30:34
That's right.
30:34
and so it sounds like you're also saying stopping,
30:38
pausing, thinking about are there other ways I can address the situation?
30:44
And then what fits best at that moment for you.
30:48
That's right. That's right. Yeah,
30:50
there's a deeper practice here that's more...
30:53
~ you know, we don't have to get into the particular strategies,
30:55
all four of them right now, although people may be interested in that when they're
30:58
facing a specific care dilemma to read about those possibilities.
31:02
But there's a deeper movement here,
31:04
which is really just about reflecting more on our care and caring more about
31:09
our care beyond the binary. So one of the things that I love about self-care
31:13
and self-compassion
31:14
as a movement is that it got people to reflect on the overall balance of their care.
31:19
And I think that it was the starting point in that conversation,
31:23
but we should be asking ourselves,
31:25
is self-care really the end all and be all of care balance?
31:28
We just care for others and then we do self-care,
31:31
and that's the end of the story?
31:33
So We-Care is really an invitation to reflect even more deeply on that care balance
31:38
and to ask ourselves,
31:39
is it really even just about balance,
31:41
or is there this possibility of synergy?
31:44
Is it more of a
31:45
Mm.
31:45
positive-sum relationship? And when we really take a look,
31:49
usually we find evidence for that,
31:51
you know, that when we're kind to other people,
31:53
we notice that there's these loops of care that come back to us over time,
31:58
you know, or when we practice
32:00
Yeah.
32:01
self-care in a moment, we do that difficult thing of setting
32:04
the boundary and practicing self-care.
32:07
And then we notice feeling more resourced and more available to
32:10
our romantic partner to spend time with them.
32:13
So when we really start to examine care across our life,
32:17
I think we'll more naturally be oriented toward this kind of undivided middle.
32:22
Wonderful. You know, one of the things I know in researching and preparing
32:27
for our conversation today is I know that you have developed a Care Pathway Quiz.
32:34
And so I wanted you to talk a little bit about it because I think it
32:37
may be helpful for people that it's like,
32:40
"Where do I sit?" So why don't you talk about that a little bit?
32:44
Yeah, thank you. ~ The Care Pathways Quiz is a self-assessment tool that I created.
32:48
It's not a research tool. I should mention that at the outset.
32:52
Maybe it will be developed in that direction someday in my lab,
32:55
but ~ at this point I created it as a self-assessment tool and really
32:59
as an opportunity. I think of the Care Pathways Quiz as itself a care pathway that
33:05
as you're taking the quiz, there's 36 questions that really invite
33:09
you to think about your care.
33:11
And think about your care blind spots and the potential care tendencies that
33:15
you may have. Maybe you find it difficult to set healthy boundaries.
33:19
Maybe you're someone who goes back and forth between self-care and care
33:24
for others kind of rapidly. And that's a pattern you've noticed in your life.
33:28
So it invites you to reflect on those things.
33:31
And then at the end, you do get a result.
33:33
I think the result is less important maybe than the process of engaging
33:37
in that kind of reflection.
33:38
But there's seven possible care pathways that can be your result.
33:41
An example of a couple of pathways:
33:43
Care Chameleon is sort of a less integrated version of what I call a Care Yogi.
33:49
So a Care Yogi would be a sort of more evolved expression,
33:53
or maybe that's not the best term,
33:54
but a more conscious expression of the Care Chameleon.
33:57
So the Care Chameleon is is probably something that many people can relate with.
34:00
It's when we tend to get pushed and pulled
34:03
into self-care or care for others by external demands.
34:07
If others are needing us, we're able to show up flexibly for them.
34:10
And then, you know, if no one is needing us,
34:13
okay, now it's my self-care time.
34:14
Instead of being more conscious and deliberate about that back-and-forth.
34:18
Now the wonderful thing about Care Chameleons is that they get really good
34:22
at that flexible movement between self-care and care for others.
34:25
And they're quite adaptable in their approach to care across their lives.
34:29
So if they just make it a more conscious practice to move back
34:33
and forth between self-care and care for others in a less divided way,
34:36
then that can become what I call a Care Yogi,
34:39
which is that we maintain that flexibility of moving back and forth between,
34:44
but we're not dividing ourselves in the process and experiencing
34:48
all the exhaustion that comes with that.
34:50
Wonderful. And if people should take,
34:52
you know, this quiz and gain some awareness,
34:55
you know, of their preferences,
34:58
what what could they do with that?
35:00
Yeah, I think the broader invitation just at the outset is to care more about your
35:05
care and to reflect on your care more through the lens of the questions.
35:09
You know, the outcome does provide you with things like your care tendency
35:14
and possible care blind spot and a path forward.
35:17
So I think the deeper invitation is really oriented toward a practice of We-Care.
35:23
And what that means is that if we're aware of a care blind spot,
35:26
if the Care Pathways Quiz reveals some kind of care blind spot that
35:30
we didn't know about, we can focus on bringing more awareness to that.
35:34
And so let's say for example, I have a care blind spot where I forget
35:38
to practice self-care. I'm really an other-oriented person,
35:42
I really identify with that, and I tend to neglect my self-care.
35:48
What are some ways that I can begin to build my awareness of
35:52
how self-care is supporting others in my life?
35:55
Can I take out my journal? I'm a big fan of journaling practices.
35:58
If I take out my journal and can I list out how does self-care,
36:03
taking care of myself, support people I care about in my life?
36:07
Support my romantic partner? Support my family members?
36:10
Forget about whether you have time for it right now.
36:13
Because that's a separate kind of thing that we can
36:14
Yeah.
36:15
return to. But just does it? Do you believe that self-care would support those other
36:20
people if you had more time to practice it?
36:22
Beginning with that kind of inquiry starts to motivate us
36:27
to build in self-care, even in micro moments throughout our life.
36:31
And it begins to chip away at that,
36:34
what I call a care blind spot in ways that make us more resourced and begin
36:39
to grow that pie of care
36:41
that's a more positive-sum kind of game.
36:44
I like that a lot because I know even with clients that I work with,
36:49
oftentimes the reframing that you being able to take care
36:55
of yourselves allows you then to be able to do what you want,
36:59
which is taking care of others.
37:01
You kind of bridge the two; they're reciprocal in a lot of ways.
37:05
That's right. That's right.
37:06
That's right.
37:07
Yeah, they're reciprocal and they're positive sum.
37:10
You know, ideally we can learn to see ~ that they're operating in
37:13
a more synergistic way. So we're caring for ourselves,
37:16
that's resourcing us to care for others.
37:18
Then as we care for others, we find benefits that come about not just in the moment,
37:23
but over time of offering that care to others.
37:26
And we begin to gradually feel more vitality and more resourcefulness across
37:31
our lives.
37:32
Because we're no longer sort of dividing ourselves and experiencing care
37:36
as this kind of zero-sum thing.
37:39
And there's some research that's relevant here too.
37:41
I think how we think about our care really matters.
37:44
And it's one of the reasons I wrote the book.
37:46
And there's some recent work showing that this term "compassion fatigue," right?
37:52
Is a misnomer. So there's research showing that that's probably more likely empathic
37:57
distress fatigue, that idea that we were talking about earlier.
38:00
Empathic distress is more of this automatic experience.
38:03
And then compassion is a more conscious and regulated response.
38:06
So to call the fatigue that comes about in helping professions "compassion fatigue"
38:11
is probably a misnomer.
38:13
And to put a point on that, there's work that shows
38:16
that when we think about
38:18
our
38:18
compassion as something that can become fatigued;
38:21
when we think about our compassion as a scarce resource,
38:26
we're actually more likely to experience fatigue from helping.
38:30
Mm.
38:30
And so if we instead transform how we're thinking about compassion
38:35
as something that actually resources us,
38:37
something that gives us energy,
38:39
and something that's not divided,
38:41
like I just give it to someone else,
38:42
and then I don't have any left for myself.
38:45
But instead to think about it as something that's naturally circular and that
38:49
Mm-hmm.
38:50
I can give care to others in an undivided way that is also feeling good to me,
38:56
and that that's actually, you know,
38:57
what compassion truly looks like in practice,
39:00
over time, the pie of compassion grows,
39:03
and we're
39:03
Mm-hmm.
39:04
less likely to experience that kind of "compassion fatigue," which
39:08
is more like empathic distress fatigue.
39:10
And part of that is that we're
39:12
less resistant of our natural tendency to be other-oriented.
39:17
It's not a problem, as I was saying earlier,
39:19
it's not really a problem to be other-oriented.
39:22
It's not a problem to want to express compassion to others and to
39:26
be a really empathic person or whatever it may be.
39:28
However, if we're resisting that experience while we're in the midst of it,
39:32
then we're creating some fatigue because we're trying to suppress it or
39:36
get rid of it,
39:38
we're rejecting on some levels our empathic nature.
39:40
Research shows that that doesn't work.
39:42
Even if we give people really complex math problems to solve in their head,
39:46
they can't turn off their empathy,
39:48
right? It doesn't work. And so if we instead embrace that we're going
39:53
to be affected by other people and situations and that we're going to
39:56
be moved to want to help, then we can cultivate this
40:00
more conscious, other-oriented response that keeps us resourced and allows
40:04
us to experience the energy that compassion can bring.
40:08
I love that. That it's not a depletion;
40:11
that actually you can expand it.
40:14
And you can work from that place of compassion.
40:18
So I wanna give you
40:19
two last questions.
40:20
The first is, you know, we've had this really,
40:24
I think, very powerful and wise conversation;
40:28
what would you want listeners to take away,
40:31
if there were two or three things from this conversation today,
40:35
what would you want them to take with them?
40:38
Yeah, thank you for that question and opportunity to summarize.
40:41
Starting with something that you're not alone in experiencing this experience
40:46
of either-or with regard to your care,
40:49
you know, the struggle of that in daily life.
40:51
The struggle of setting healthy boundaries,
40:54
the struggle of knowing, when a friend calls,
40:57
do I go hang out with them or do I prioritize self-care time?
41:00
That struggle is real and many of us can relate to that
41:04
struggle on a daily basis. So starting with just that,
41:07
that the complexity of care is real and that you're not alone in that kind
41:11
of struggle on a daily basis. And then secondly,
41:14
that you can start small to begin to transform that experience.
41:18
I like to say start with one orientation of care.
41:21
Notice where your care is flowing more naturally in an instance.
41:24
So if you tend to be an other-oriented person,
41:27
start there. If you're feeling really,
41:29
you know, this tendency towards self-care in the moment,
41:32
start there. But don't stop there.
41:34
Bring in the other orientation of care and make it a more kind
41:38
of both-and awareness. Can I hold care for myself and care for this other person
41:43
in mind at the same time? Right?
41:46
Just starting there. And then the third thing is just that there is another way.
41:50
There is a third way, ~ what I call a third way beyond this kind
41:53
of either-or mindset around care,
41:55
where we increasingly experience ourselves as
42:00
capable of finding these healthy middles between self-care and care for others.
42:04
We increasingly feel resourced as we care for others and we're
42:08
not forgetting about our needs in the process.
42:10
And as we care for ourselves, we feel less of this inner conflict
42:14
and guilt for doing so because we're understanding its potential benefits
42:18
for others. So there is this other way.
42:21
And yeah, I call that way We-Care,
42:22
but you could call it interconnected compassion or any number of other things.
42:27
And just to know that you don't have to keep living in that kind
42:30
of either-or mindset around care.
42:32
So one last question because I want to end on a really positive note.
42:37
What gives you hope about care?
42:40
For ourselves, each other, even across the globe?
42:45
You know, in writing the book,
42:46
it became very obvious to me, you know,
42:48
it's not about rejecting self-care.
42:50
We're not watering down our self-care to practice We-Care.
42:52
We're embracing self-care and self-compassion and bringing them along for the ride.
42:57
And it became obvious to me that there are so many people out there
43:00
who are already celebrating self-care,
43:03
advocating for self-care in their community,
43:05
advocating for self-compassion,
43:07
promoting awareness of the importance of that concept in their communities.
43:11
At the same time, there are so many people out there celebrating kindness
43:15
and celebrating compassion for others and the importance of that in our communities.
43:20
But unfortunately, there's not that much right now in society about that middle
43:26
zone, this middle zone that I call We-Care.
43:28
I find hope in the fact that
43:30
there's people celebrating both of those sides of what I call,
43:34
you know, the care spectrum or the care continuum.
43:36
I guess I would just invite anyone listening to join me in this practice
43:42
of embracing that healthy middle zone,
43:44
both as a personal practice and as an opportunity to advocate
43:48
for that healthy middle across our lives,
43:50
you know, reminding that friend that when they're practicing self-care,
43:54
it's not just about them.
43:55
They don't have to feel guilty for that,
43:57
but that it's actually helping everyone in their life,
43:59
or reminding your coworker who's really stressed out to take a break and
44:04
get a snack and get a coffee and come back when they're feeling more resourced
44:08
and that you support that in them.
44:10
So we can really become advocates,
44:12
I think, for this interconnected view of care.
44:15
And I think seeing how much people advocate for care more broadly gives me hope.
44:21
Wonderful. Thank you so much for this conversation that really reframes care
44:27
not as a trade-off, but something that we can expand on together.
44:31
It is a powerful reminder that wellness doesn't happen in isolation;
44:37
it happens in relationships and in context.
44:40
With that, I would like to sincerely thank you,
44:44
Jordan,
44:45
for being here today and sharing your wisdom and your work with us.
44:49
And to the listeners, thank you for joining as always.
44:53
And remember: Wellness is a journey,
44:56
not a destination. Please take good care of yourself.
45:00
And I look forward to you joining us next time for "Wellness in Today's World."
45:05
Thanks so much, Debra.