Today’s meditation was written by Cathy Self, Senior Vice President for the Baptist Healing Trust.

     Many of us are familiar with the concept of compassion fatigue. According to one researcher, compassion fatigue is "a function of bearing witness to the suffering of others." In many of the helping professions, healing and hope come from the caregiver’s ability to be present with authenticity, positive regard, and empathy. That very empathy, however, opens the opportunity in the caregiver to not just understand but to also internalize the distress felt by the one who is in pain. A more recent finding suggests that many caregivers may also experience compassion satisfaction. As described by researchers, compassion satisfaction plays a key role in reducing compassion fatigue and in mitigating burnout. Compassion satisfaction is among the harmonies I hear sung by the voice of Love, calling us to joy.

     Compassion satisfaction is, according to scholars, directly related to the quality of the professional’s interaction with colleagues, and may result from seeing one’s job as a calling. When this term was first introduced it was described as "the pleasure a caregiver derives from being able to do the work well, and the joy gained from helping others, especially in the face of potentially distressing work." Some caregivers seem naturally prone to experience compassion satisfaction. Others seem to find ways to focus on sources of pleasure and joy, like the creative arts highlighted this week in this journal, and to practice exceptional self-care. In the best of days it is easy to find meaning in our work, joining with others around a common purpose or value. In the most challenging of days, Love calls us to courageously face and reframe the negativity that may rise within and around us.

     One such reframe is found in a beautiful poem by Fra Giovanni (1513) who encourages us to look to those things that may create in us deep satisfaction in our work:

There is nothing I can give you/ which you do have not;/ But there is much, very much, that/ while I cannot give it, you can take.

No heaven can come to us unless our/ hearts find rest in today. Take heaven!/ No peace lies in the future which is not/ hidden in this present instant./ Take peace!

The gloom of the world is but a shadow./ Behind it, yet within reach, is joy./ There is a radiance and glory in the/ darkness, could we but see, and to see,/ we have only to look. I beseech you/ to look.

     Each of us who visit this journal have the gifts of wisdom and experience in choosing joy – the invitation is open to you to share them with each other in this place. Peace and all good!