Anything we do for the first time will feel awkward for a while. When we start to learn a new instrument, we can’t even play the simplest of scales. When we start lifting weights, we can barely do one rep at the lowest weight without tiring. When we start running, we can run only a single block before being too winded to continue. When we start learning a new language, we struggle with the simplest of phrases. A new dance? Our feet are in tangles. Anything new that we try we are bound to struggle with at least a little bit.

The same is true for learning a new habit, as James Clear so eloquently pointed out in his book Atomic Habits. When you start practicing doing whatever habit you have chosen, it is going to feel awkward and uncomfortable.

Being compassionate falls under that same umbrella. Believe it or not, being compassionate is a habit. As such, we much build the compassion muscle through regular exercise and practice. When you first start to train your brain to be more compassionate, it will likely feel awkward and uncomfortable. After all, if this is a new skill for you, it is likely that non-compassion is pretty ingrained into your daily life. If so, your first knee-jerk reaction will likely tend toward the non-compassionate reaction. It’s ok. Gently correct yourself (thereby also showing some compassion to yourself at the same time) and try again. Exercise your compassion muscle a little every day and soon you will see it start to build.

Why Should We Have Compassion?

Maybe you’re not convinced that it’s worth the effort to have compassion for others. Maybe you think that you have learned the hard way, and others have to learn the hard way too. Maybe nobody’s had compassion for you, so you don’t see what you should have to have compassion for them.

Traversing the Mountain

For the sake of this conversation, let’s assume that life can be viewed as a series of paths on a huge mountain. We are all navigating these interwoven paths. Naturally some of us will be higher up the mountain than others, or even on another side of the mountain entirely. But let’s say that we all start at the bottom of the mountain. We all start at the starting point – at zero elevation. And let’s say that we all need to figure out our own goal and then achieve it. Not only is this challenging, but this is more challenging for some than for others. Some of us have excellent guides that teach us some valuable skills early on the paths. Some of us start out with essentially no guides at all. Others of us have guides who haven’t figured out their goals and so inadvertently lead us astray.

Regardless, we all start out heading up this mountain. We all make mistakes. We all progress, albeit at different rates.

What compassion looks like for those of us on the path:

Let’s say that we were taught by our guides that it is rude to talk to the other travelers, especially to ask them where they are headed. Our guides informed us that this is strictly taboo. The first time that we are approached by a fellow traveler who asks us where we are headed we are likely to be appalled. After all, we (wrongly) assume that everybody was given the same set of rules for this journey. We assume that they are breaking this rule on purpose. What we often don’t stop to consider is that they are not breaking the rules that they were given. It is likely that their guides taught them that asking others where they are headed is kind and inquisitive rather than rude.

Or maybe we are taught that we should focus only on our journey and not the journeys of those around us. So when we look down onto a section that is a few hundred feet below us and see others struggling to climb that particular section of the path, we might be inclined to judge them for attempting to do it differently than we did. Or maybe we judge them for needing to rest more along the way. Perhaps we feel an air of superiority because we are where we are on the path, rather than where they are.

The truth is that not so long ago, we were where they are on the path. Not so long ago, we were struggling up that section as well. If we didn’t struggle much on that section, we might assume that they are doing something wrong. The compassionate thought, though, is that they had different guides, and are at different points along the trail. Maybe they are struggling so overtly because they have, in fact, been up and down the mountain many times, and are more weary than we are on our first attempt at climbing it.

• Being compassionate towards others is an acknowledgment that we do not know their struggle.
• Being compassionate towards others acknowledges that we could use some compassion too sometimes. That we make mistakes sometimes.
• Being compassionate towards others acknowledges that we have all had different experiences and we cannot assume that anybody else has followed the same path as we have.

So, why be compassionate? Because we don’t know anybody else’s struggle. And while we are all on our own individual journeys, we are all in this together and it never hurts to help each other out a bit. When we have slipped up and made a mistake ourselves, or done something that was viewed by another to be unacceptable, don’t we want to be given the benefit of the doubt? We have all made mistakes, broken another person’s unspoken rules, or just been thoughtless from time to time. We all deserve a certain level of compassion to begin with.

Getting Started: Telling Yourself the Most Generous Story

You will likely have to endure a good bit of discomfort when it comes to your first few experiences (or even your first few dozen experiences) exercising your compassion muscle. You are also likely to get it wrong at first or to feel unsure whether your new practiced response is a good one. Maybe some fears rise up that you will be taken advantage of if you don’t stand up for yourself. Maybe it feels risky to show compassion. I encourage you to take that risk – see how it plays out. After all, showing compassion is a sign of true strength.

So how can we train ourselves? I find it useful to notice my initial response. For the sake of this exercise, we will assume that that is the non-compassionate response. Then I try to imagine what the polar opposite response would be and play that out in my head. Once I have these two responses in mind, my goal is to land somewhere in the middle.

Let’s look at a few examples of how this might go.

Setup: A driver cuts you off in traffic.

• Non-Compassionate Response: What an asshole! I hate drivers. Flip him off and scream obscenities at him – I don’t care if he can hear me.
• Overly-Compassionate Response: Oh wow – that was dangerous. There’s no way he saw me or he would never have done that.
• Landing in the Middle: Wow, that annoyed me. I’m going to assume that he is having a really rough day so I’ll let it go this time.

Setup: Your friend is late to a planned outing.

• Non-Compassionate Response: What a jerk – he doesn’t care about anybody but himself. I’m not going to wait for him and see if I ever invite him anywhere again. He just lost his chance at being my friend.
• Overly-Compassionate Response: I’m absolutely sure that something terrible must have happened. I will wait an indefinite amount of time for him to show up.
• Landing in the Middle: I’m annoyed that he’s late, but he usually isn’t. I choose to give him the benefit of the doubt until I learn the real story. I will reach out to check on him. If I can’t reach him, I will wait 15 minutes, before continuing with my day.

Setup: A new acquaintance asks you how much money you make at your job.

• Non-Compassionate Response: How dare she ask me that! How rude! Everybody knows that you aren’t supposed to ask that question. Not only will I not tell her, but I will never speak to her again. Not ever.
• Overly-Compassionate Response: I’m surprised by that question, but I guess I have to answer. It would be rude not to.
• Landing in the Middle: Oh, wow! That question surprised me. I was taught that questions like that were rude. I guess she was taught differently. I’m not comfortable telling her, so I’ll let her know that in a nice way.

Exercise your compassion muscle by considering both the non-compassionate response, as well as the overly-compassionate response before landing in the middle.

Learning the More Accurate Story

Sometimes while you are you exercising your compassion muscle, you will find yourself continuing to tell yourself the same generous story with the same people. Telling yourself the most generous story is a useful thing to do when you have an absence of facts or data. Over time, though, with people, patterns arise.

The generous stories are helpful when you have little to no information on which to fill in any missing blanks about a person. When you have few facts and few interactions with someone (i.e., in the absence of data), you are left making assumptions, so make the most generous one. There will usually come a point when you have enough data to be able to shift the story from the most generous one to a more accurate, data-based one. Even so, you will still be left with a choice in how to handle each situation.

For example, maybe you have a friend that is late to every event. The first several times they are late, you tell yourself the most generous story that you can. Soon, though, you recognize that your friend is habitually late – in fact, this friend has really never been on time to any event. In this case, you can begin to be honest with yourself and tell yourself the more realistic story.

Let’s take the same examples as above, but this time assume that they have been happening in a patterned way with the same people. Let’s imagine how we might maintain compassion while also showing ourselves compassion. How might this change the story we tell ourselves?

Setup: The same driver continues to cut you off in traffic (Note: This would admittedly be exceedingly rare, but let’s imagine that perhaps your neighbor happens to leave at the same time as you and often cuts you off.)

• Non-Compassionate Response: What an asshole! That guy is always cutting me off. He must hate me, and the feeling is mutual. I know where he lives, I’ll let my dog use his yard as a toilet from now on.
• Overly-Compassionate Response: That same guy always cuts me off – he must have somewhere to go that is more important than where I’m going.
• Landing in the Middle: Wow, that guy continues to cut me off. I might have to go and talk with him later to see if there is something he is upset about – I’d rather talk it out than use our cars to battle each other.

Setup: Your friend is always late to planned outings.

• Non-Compassionate Response: What a jerk – he doesn’t care about anybody but himself. I’m going to start showing up late to everything too. I can be later than him.
• Overly-Compassionate Response: He is always late, so I will just bake in extra time for him and start telling him we are meeting earlier than we really are. That way I won’t have to wait as long.
• Landing in the Middle: Him being late to every event is beginning to be a problem. I’m going to have to talk with him about this. I’m not wanting to continue making plans with him if he can never bring himself to be on time for them. I will talk to him first to see what he says.

Setup: A particular acquaintance continues to talk to you about how much money you make at work.

• Non-Compassionate Response: That woman is so rude. I have to see her, but I will pretend like she doesn’t exist. I just simply won’t look her in the eye or respond to her at all. She deserves it for being so incredibly rude.
• Overly-Compassionate Response: I’m surprised by how she loves to keep talking about money, but I don’t want to be rude. I’ll just keep talking with her about it, I guess. Maybe I’ll sit on the other side of the room when I can.
• Landing in the Middle: She keeps talking about money and salaries. I’m going to have to address it, if we are going to continue to run into each other. I will explain to her that I was taught that such topics were inappropriate so I’m not comfortable talking about them. I will see how she responds to that.

As you exercise your compassion muscle, you will learn when you have over-used it, and it needs to be rested for a bit. Gathering data about and experiences with people will inevitably lead you to telling yourself more accurate stories.

What’s At Risk?

You might find yourself afraid of exercising your compassion muscle. You might be afraid that others will view you as weak. Or maybe you are afraid of becoming passive, a door mat for others to walk all over. If you do find yourself afraid for these reasons, or for any reason, I encourage you to consider that fear on its own. Maybe it’s a fear worth conquering.

In reality, showing compassion is a sign of strength. Showing compassion is a sign of maturity and centeredness. Showing compassion is a sign of confidence and leadership.

So, acknowledge any fear you might have or any deeply-ingrained belief you might be holding onto when it comes to compassion. Bring that fear or that belief out into the light and then address it directly. You might be surprised to discover that the fear is unfounded, the belief outdated or just wrong.

Personal Example

I recently had the experience of witnessing a colleague of mine publicly (and anonymously, mercifully) shaming somebody who had reached out to her. According to her post, this person had personally reached out to her via a messaging app. He had asked her if she would be willing to help him out with something.

Now, admittedly, this might not be a great attempt at networking. And admittedly he might have been off-base.

But he still reached out. So what were her options?

• Non-Compassionate Response: Send him a scathing response about how awful he is OR Quietly ignore him AND post publicly a scathing rant about his method of reaching out.
• Overly-Compassionate Response: He must have meant well, so I suppose I have to help him out.
• Landing in the Middle: Reply to him letting him know how his message landed. Ask if he is open to hearing some constructive advice on how he could improve his networking skills OR reply to him with a polite no and a brief explanation on why you are unwilling to help him.

She chose the Non-Compassionate Option. What she chose to do is to post his message online (mercifully with the name hidden) and then proceeded to rant for about 500 words on how awful this was for him to reach out to her in this way. She also noted that she would not be responding to him at all.

Not only is this not compassionate, this is not good leadership and this is not kind. This is not setting a good example for others who might be looking up to you. This is not a mature way of responding in the world.

Now, so that I may choose to give her the benefit of the doubt, she likely thought that it was very obvious that he did the wrong thing. Was it obvious? Not to me, but it did seem to be obvious to her. I’m imagining that because he reached out to her in this way, he didn’t view it as being an obvious misstep either.

I recognize that pointing out others’ mistakes can be a valuable teaching tool. I would contend, though, that you can use the example as an illustration of what not to do, while also choosing the middle-of-the-road option which includes a level of compassion and telling yourself the generous story about the person.

It also concerns me how many people joined in lambasting this poor man (whom they didn’t know) for simply reaching out. Having exercised my compassion muscle quite a bit, I imagine that it might have taken a lot of courage for the man to reach out to her. Getting others to side with you against another person, though, leads pretty rapidly into common enemy bonding, with him as the enemy, unbeknownst to him. When she posted on this topic and received a lot of likes and kudos and agreement, she got more stoked in her viewpoint, more dug-in to her stance.

Let’s look at how she could have exercised her compassion muscle a little and still used this example as an illustration of how to not network. Maybe she could have responded to the sender with a polite response. She then could have posted something like the following:

“I was recently reminded of how not to network when somebody reached out to me asking for a favor with no previous contact. It is important to build a relationship before requesting something from the other person.”

In that example, the person that sent her the message would have learned something, as would her network, but not at anyone’s expense.

Mountain Example

When you hear a cry for help from someone that you perceive to be behind you on the path, consider both the non-compassionate and the overly-compassionate actions and then choose one that lands in the middle.

• Option A: Ignore their request for help and choose to tell those near you on the path how terrible they are for having requested the help in the way that they did. They are SO inexperienced – they don’t deserve the time of day from you.
• Option B: Give them any help they need.
• Option C: Let them know how you felt receiving their request for help with no other previous contact but seeing if you can do anything for them that won’t set you back too far on the path. You can share with those around you what you learned from this experience, so that they might learn as well.

The last option is the landing-in-the-middle option, the one that has the greatest potential to teach both the help-seeker and those around you. You will have modeled compassion, while also showing compassion to all.

Hypocrisy?

I questioned myself on writing this post. Which option was I choosing in opting to write this post? Was I exercising my own compassion muscle?

Let’s take a look at my options:

• Option A: Take my colleague’s post and scratch out her name and repost it on my social media accounts ranting about how awful her actions were OR I can post a comment on her post saying how awful of a human she is.
• Option B: Do nothing, maybe even learn from her.
• Option C: Recognize that she is at a different point on the path than I am on, and has had different guides and different experiences. Therefore, I can give her the benefit of the doubt, while also anonymously using this example to teach others. [Often I believe that reaching out to talk to the person about the issue is a requirement, but in this case, she did not ask me for anything, nor did she say it directly to me.]

I’m choosing the final option, which is a landing-in-the-middle option. I did some thinking about whether I should say something to her. Generally, I think a direct conversation is better than no conversation. However, given my other experiences with her, I have reason to believe that such a direct conversation would result in further misunderstanding and disagreement. Therefore, I opted to let it go.

However, that being said, if she does ever ask me for direct feedback on my interactions with her, I will be politely honest and let her know my true thoughts. Until then, though, I will use the anonymous example to help teach a point that I find to be valuable.

In Closing

Try exercising your own compassion muscle, even when it feels awkward at first. You will always be glad that you did this particular exercise. It might feel uncomfortable, but you’ll know that muscle is growing stronger.

It feels good when others are compassionate with you, and it feels good to be compassionate with others. If you find yourself afraid for any reason, I urge you to consider that fear on its own. Being compassionate is worth the risk.