How to fix compassion fatigue

Do you ever suffer from compassion fatigue?

If you’re like me, you were sort of checking the news a lot on Sunday evening about the shooting in Gilroy. I was looking for a couple of friends to show up on Social Media to know they were safe. It hit close to home. As did Tanforan. And as did the YouTube shooting a couple of years ago.

What's interesting (and somehow sad for me) is my interest in other mass shootings, my concern or care, isn't nearly as intense. 

I think 3 people died in Gilroy. 3 people also died last weekend in a Chicago shooting. I didn't check the news at all about that one. 

Why? What's the difference? Life is life, right?

I think the following thought captures the dynamic:

When you’re in the story, you care about the story.

Sadly, I don’t have the same level of engagement when disaster strikes elsewhere.

For example can any of us actually name the some of the worst natural disasters in the last ten years?  

Hurricane Katrina with 1,300 dead? For sure. The earthquake in Haiti in 2010 in which 225,000 perished?  Yes. What about the storm that hit Puerto Rico a few years ago? Of course.

But do you remember Cyclone Nargis? 140,000 people died in Burma (Myanmar) in 2008?  What about the 2008 Sichuan Earthquake in China that killed 84,000 people?

How is that 1,500 people die in a tragedy in New Orleans and I remember it vividly, but almost a quarter million people die in China and Burma and my memory is fuzzy?

When you’re in the story, you care about the story.

How do you bridge that gap and get yourself to care when it doesn't hit close to home?

You start by finding common ground . 

• Remember a time when you faced a crisis and someone helped you out.
• Relate it to something similar that did hit home.
• If you have no story like it, try putting yourself into the story  through your imagination:
  • Imagine a wall of water came out of the Bay and wiped out East San Mateo leaving 50,000 dead.  What would you do? How would you respond?
  • Imagine someone came to your home and took your daughter from her bedroom while she was sleeping…
  • Imagine that your son was being threatened by a local gang or drug lord. What would you do?

Like you, I pray for the people who are suffering. And as a Christian, I will remind myself to pray more for people I’ll never meet whose stories we’ll barely hear.

I am committed to caring about things around the world, not just in my backyard. And so, I’ll spend time trying to place myself (and others) in the stories that matter most in this life. Because on this side of eternity, we live in a world where we care most about the stories we see ourselves in.

I look forward to the day we’ll care about everything the way God does.  Until then, finding common ground so we can see ourselves in stories we should care about will continue to be a discipline I hone.