Good for you, good for others

Good for you, good for others

Posted on 10 March 2011 - 07:02pm

A FEW years ago, I attended a lecture by Mother Teresa's confessor. His face surprised me – he looked stern, a distinct contrast from the kind and jolly faces of Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh and the Dalai Lama.

Part of the lecture touched on compassion. He told us of a conversation he had with a young Hindu, whom he mentored. The boy, I am guessing, was faced with a person whom he found hard to forgive due to anger and disappointment.

The priest surprised me. His reply: "I told the boy: one day in your life, you may find that kindness is not what you thought it to be."

I could not understand what he meant. Was not God all about kindness, forgiveness and love? Is this priest trying to preach unforgiveness? His advice seemed to extend beyond establishing firm boundaries in order to prevent people from stepping all over you. I called my mother and told her I did not like Mother Teresa's priest.

Years later, work has taught me what he meant. This past year, I have had the privilege to serve children and families from high-risk and vulnerable backgrounds, with focus on teenagers. By high-risk and vulnerable I mean persons, who, by virtue of being non-Malaysian, are denied education and exposed to systemic and public abuse.

This does not exclude Malaysian teenagers who break your heart again and again. A significant part of the work colleagues and I do is outreach with young people living in red-light areas.

Their stories emerge a piece at a time. Many when they finally trust you, reveal they use and sell drugs and their bodies. Both young women and men prostitute themselves, and many young men sell their girlfriends nightly and use the money to buy heroin and crystal meth.

When press and academic researchers come to interview, they often ask: what are your success rates? I tell them that the more high-risk your clientele are, the lower your success rate.

This does not mean that we have not successfully reunited teenagers with families, checked them into drug rehabilitation centres or built support systems so that they feel that they have family.

At times, we feel like professional beggars: begging a child who is not yet 18 years not to return to the streets, not to meet his gang members that night or not to drink. Only to wonder, whether, when you see the teen the next morning, there will be needle marks on his arm – that heroin use and possible HIV infection took place.

I am now less judgmental of how couples practise love. Anyone who comes from a tumultuous and tempestuous background, if it is violent and teaches that your body is a tool to be used and not to cherish, will cling to whatever beacon is available. Especially if that beacon comes in the form of a man who loves you – never mind that he sells you night after night, or in the form of a girl who loves you – even though her drug habit gets you into trouble again and again.

Each underage client is a human being in need of intervention often lasting months, if not years – the nature of working with non-adults who are vulnerable: in terms of food and shelter, and who require family, love and the wisdom of mentors.

Supporting a teenager facing trauma is emotionally, mentally and physically taxing. One of my closest colleagues and I often share how we dread the sound of our phones ringing: Will this be another hospital call, to inform someone is dead? Is it the police to tell us a kid's in lock-up again?

People tell my colleagues and I that we must be extremely kind because they could never do our work. Many think that such compassion is inborn and that we know how to take care of ourselves. However, we too are human beings who are susceptible to illness and exhaustion. Many social and humanitarian workers experience burnout in the form of post-traumatic stress disorder or secondary trauma, which explains high turnover rates across the many professions dealing with human rights abuse on the frontline.

Many workers battle physical illness and mental trauma while running against time to save clients, with the knowledge that success is never a guarantee. Putting the client first unequivocally places many in unhealthy habits and lifestyles: many of us chain-smoke, sleep little, eat fatty but convenient food and give up exercise and hobbies.

Recently, I thought of what that old confessor said. Why I thought he was unkind, and how, maybe, I was too young then to understand what he sincerely meant.

There is a fine balance with no easy answers between self-care and selfishness, and between being kind and practising stupid compassion.

Perhaps that old man knew his role as Mother Teresa's confessor was this: to teach her that true kindness is given to all beings. The practice of compassion towards others must include oneself.

The writer is an amateur cook and yoga practitioner in her free time. Comments: letters@thesundaily.com