So, I was catching up on some of the local "social news" as I get it served up via the Nextdoor App for our area.
One of our not-so-far-away neighborhood members had gotten themselves burned in service of assuming the role of Good Samaritan on the eve of the recent Solstice, when a fairly windy and stout winter storm moved through.
An evidently homeless person had been shivering under a dirty old blanket, holding a "Please Help!" cardboard sign, while camped out near the bank of mailboxes at the end of their cul-de-sac... so these good people had taken it upon themselves to invite this person in, serve him a hot meal and offer that he could spend the night on a cot in the heated workshop adjacent to their garage.
Evidently, the homeless man seemed quite coherent and sincerely grateful for the kindness.
However, in the morning — when the husband came out to offer him a cup of coffee — there was not only no sign of him to be found in/around the house, but he'd peed on the floor a couple of times (even though there was a bathroom) and several pretty expensive power tools were missing.
"No Good Deed Goes Unpunished"
or so the old saying goes.
But sometimes people's seemingly good nature seems more like a case of what's sometimes referred to as "Idiot Compassion."
When does kindness stop being kindness, and instead become stupidity?
I have long been a fan of Pema Chödrön's writings on compassion because even though she's the embodiment of the Buddhist ideal of "Loving-Kindness" she also addresses this very issue that being "a nice person" at all times isn't necessarily the most compassionate thing we can do.
Throwing yourself into a roaring freezing winter river to try to save someone, thereby also causing your own certain death is neither compassionate nor very smart.
Society may teach us the dubious "lesson" that doing so is heroic but we don't really need any dead heroes.
We also don't hand alcoholics another bottle so they can continue suffering.
Sometimes, Allowing Failure IS Compassion!
"Idiot Compassion" is essentially a kinder variation on what we typically call enabling.
One of Chödrön's writings that has stayed with me for several decades is the reality that sometimes the most compassionate thing we can do for someone is to allow them to fail... because that failure represents the only way they will be able to escape their own cycle of suffering.
This is particularly true in co-dependent relationships where one person has some kind of toxic addiction, and the other person is essentially enabling that behavior to continue through what they authentically believe is kindness.
Of course, there is nothing wrong with the underlying ideal of wanting to give a homeless person a leg-up... and there's every chance that this was just an isolated incident.
Regardless, however, it's still a poignant reminder that it is wise to have common sense boundaries, and not to let your emotional attachments to "being helpful" overwhelm them!
Thanks for reading, and have a great rest of your day!
How about YOU? Have you ever caught yourself "being helpful" when it would have been wiser NOT to? How did the situation turn out? Would you say we sometimes go overboard on trying to help where we really shouldn't? Comments, feedback and other interaction is invited and welcomed! Because — after all — SOCIAL content is about interacting, right? Leave a comment — share your experiences — be part of the conversation!
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Created at 20201227 18:55 PST
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