 |
||||||||
|
 |
|
||||||
|
||||||||
|
||||||||
|
||||||||
 |
|
By Shirah Bell, Director of Everyday Holiness Program When I write about Mussar I like to emphasize what I think of as successes. But we all know that we learn more from our mistakes so I will share a recent one. A close friend lost something I had entrusted to him and then responded by saying it wasn’t his responsibility. I felt betrayed, but decided to put into practice what I had read from the Chazon Ish about the “ideal person”:
I put myself in my friend’s shoes, and understood what might have led him to deny responsibility. I told myself, I excuse him completely. I wrote him a brief email releasing him from responsibility. Then I attempted to go on with our friendship as if nothing had happened. It didn’t work. He brought up the incident each time we talked, and I found myself on edge, wanting to blame him, but reminding myself that I had excused him and therefore needed to keep quiet. I asked myself, “What is wrong here?” I wrote in my journal, exploring the various aspects of compassion. I scoured my Mussar texts. I was looking for middot that might have a role in keeping this situation alive – something I needed to see, but was missing. Was I just a failure at compassion? I conferred with my Mussar friends. And I prayed. Then it hit me: my attempt to excuse him was motivated not only by compassion for him, but even more by my own aversion to confronting him and holding him accountable for what he had done. As I probed the Chazon Ish’s statement, I realized that “excusing completely” necessitated more than an email. I needed to speak with him in such a way that he experienced the forgiveness. Clearly he had not. What is authentic compassion (rachamim) in this kind of situation? Alan Morinis writes that rachamim is “a deep emotional feeling arising out of identification with the other that seeks a concrete expression.” OK, I did identify with him. I could see myself before I began Mussar study acting just as he had in this case. I felt empathy for him and his situation. However, Alan emphasizes that compassion is not just empathizing, but requires taking action. As I write this, I realize that the action I took, in forgiving in my heart and saying to him that there was no problem, was not enough. The appropriate action was to talk with him, listen to him, ask that he listen to me, and together attempt to reconstruct our friendship. Orchot Tzaddikim (The Ways of the Righteous) provides beautiful guidance in rachamim. The author emphasizes that we need to have compassion for the person’s soul, more than their body. How could I have been compassionate to his soul? I could have spoken more honestly with him, and found a way to say with kindness that I thought what he had done was hurtful to me and that I wanted to talk with him about it so we could reach a mutually satisfactory resolution. Speaking graciously is an essential part of compassion. The Talmud states “One who gives a penny to a poor man is blessed with six blessings, but one who conciliates him with words is blessed with eleven.” So we’ve agreed to get together in person and talk openly and graciously with the intention of reconstructing our relationship. I’m guessing you, dear reader, may have in some moment failed to live up to your standards. Take a look and ask, “Was I being authentic? Did I have a full understanding of the middah I was working on? Who can help me think this through?” As we say in the trade, another growth opportunity – and opportunity for developing a richer Mussar practice. |
|
|
||||
