Applying Mindful Compassionate Dialogue to Violence in Ukraine

Mar 3

As you grapple with the tragic violence in Ukraine, I want to offer support for maintaining the consciousness of connection and compassion. In this Connection Gem, I offer two primary strategies:

How to maintain self connection that benefits our global community, along with ideas for action.
Acknowledge the power of what you envision, and engage in an exercise for applying the consciousness and skills of Mindful Compassionate Dialogue in an imaginary scenario.

How to maintain self connection

Whether you are in the midst of your own suffering or are witnessing the suffering of others as in the people suffering from violence in Ukraine, the priority is to remain as self connected as you can so that your responses carry as much wisdom and compassion as possible.

For example, upon hearing about the people of the Russian military attacking the people living in Ukraine, you might begin by naming your thoughts and feelings aloud. You likely have feelings of shock, anger, fear, grief, despair, or hopelessness. Your mind might begin to race with ideas about what it means not only for the people directly involved, but also for our global community and then for your local community. You might find yourself making dire predictions about what this could lead to, and trigger more fear for yourself and for those around you. You might notice a series of labels or judgments about world leaders and the actions they take or don’t take.

These are common reactions: let any one have its space while maintaining as much mindfulness as you can. This means identifying it as a reaction and connecting to your intention to find your center again. As you find your center again, you will naturally come in contact with grief and mourning. Allow this expression of sadness. Feel the deep grief as you acknowledge that there are people in the world who are trapped in tragic ideas and strategies and are so disconnected from their own hearts that they cannot see that their own healing, safety and belonging depends on the healing, safety and belonging of others.

Let yourself feel the grief upon witnessing the injustice, pain, and suffering of others. Notice what happens in your heart, your throat, your breath, your belly, your body as you watch the news or reflect on violence occurring in the world. As you begin to turn your attention to your feelings and what you long for (your needs) allow the tears. Allow yourself to make the sounds of grief -- a whisper, a shout, a cry, or a moan. Breath in feeling the grief. Breath out wishing for healing and peace.

And then let this suffering that you are witnessing inspire you to re-center in your practice, to strengthen your seat of compassion, and to direct your attention towards thoughts and actions that are vibrating with the energy of love and care. It is this orientation that will help you find specific, doable, and wise action.

A first specific and doable action could be feeling and expressing empathy for the people of Ukraine. Let’s make some empathy guesses right now imagining that we are speaking with someone living in Ukraine:

Do you feel terrified and shocked and need safety and protection?
Do you feel grief stricken regarding the loss and impact in the life of your children, family, community and animals?
Are you cold and hungry and need shelter and food?
Do you feel heartbroken needing support and care?
Do you feel lonely needing support and companionship for the intensity of your experience?
Do you feel frightened and worried and need predictability and security?

What do you notice as you imagine offering empathy and compassion to the people of Ukraine?

Whenever your mind turns toward anger and judgment or fear about an uncertain future, you can redirect your attention towards empathy and compassion for the suffering you see around you. In that moment of redirecting your attention, you can get curious about their experience and imagine your care touching their hearts like a soothing balm.

From this connection with your heart, you can ask yourself what else you will do to contribute to a global consciousness of connection: What's authentic for you? What's true for you? How can you stretch yourself to be more fully present and available in this interconnected web of life?

Do you lead or join a petition, peace dance, or a protest march? Do you change how you shop? Do you deepen your meditation practice so that you can remain stable in radiating love and visions of peace? Do you organize your colleagues and co-workers to offer a resource that you have? For example, among the community of certified trainers in Nonviolent Communication someone has organized empathy calls to Ukraine; knowing that being seen and heard and accompanied can bring great comfort in the midst of violence and upheaval. See the end of this article for other resources for taking action.

If your mind is caught in enemy images and judgment, in addition to offering empathy, you can also shift to envisioning the world you would like to live in by imagining differently the very people you might be judging. Let's do an experiment in that regard.

Envision the change you want to see in the world

While you may not be able to have a one-on-one conversation with world leaders or those taking violent action, you can stretch your consciousness and skills to imagine a world in which that was possible.

When you think of global situations, you might notice a tendency of your mind to generalize and forget that the Russian military and all military forces are made up of individuals and that the Russian government and all governments that collude with oppressive systems that lead to violence are made up of individuals. When you remember this, it will be easier to imagine how the consciousness and skills of Mindful Compassionate Dialogue could apply in this situation.

In Ukraine Vladimir Putin is the most immediate or superficial cause and yet, of course, you know that causes and conditions are infinitely complex. One person can trigger massive consequences, and that person lives within a complex web of circumstances created by other individuals past and present which have made their single decision possible.

Let's go ahead and imagine that not only do you have the opportunity to have a one-on-one conversation with President Putin, you have an unlimited amount of time together just to connect. Since you are in imagination you can create the ideal. Imagine that you are in a beautiful cabin surrounded by the quiet and calm of nature, perhaps on an isolated beach or deep in the mountains. This cabin exists in timelessness, such that when you leave, you will re-enter the world only a moment later than when you left. In this ideal scenario, you also imagine that Vladimir Putin arrives in an expansive state– that is, he is not perceiving a threat to his sense of safety, belonging, or respect. In this imaginary scenario let's look at 4 essential elements:

Dissolve enemy images
Engage in supportive community
Set up a space that supports connection
Identify systems of oppression, invite mourning, and identify specific and doable steps for change

It's important to acknowledge that any of these four items listed above have and could have entire volumes of books dedicated to them. Here, we only begin to touch on each of these with the hope that even remembering them is already making a change.

1. Dissolve enemy images

You get to the cabin first and begin to get ready by preparing your consciousness. Realizing that you will meet Vladimir in person, you notice that he immediately becomes more real for you and less of an image or an idea. You move toward seeing him as a fellow human being by reading about his life and imagining what it was like to grow up in his particular home. You try to imagine the resources he had and the resources that may have been totally absent, especially emotional resources. You imagine specific emotional challenges he may have faced. For example, it might be easy for you to imagine Vladimir as a 3 or 4 year old boy experiencing shame and pressure to perform and repress vulnerability. You continue guessing at particular experiences, choosing to imagine his life in ways that contribute to a sense of openness and care in your heart.

You're careful not to enter into an analysis that includes ideas that you are superior or more evolved and pity or condescension. To avoid this trap, you look for possible shared experiences. You ask yourself what you might have in common with him. At the very least, you can name the universals. For example, reflecting on childhood you can name that, like Vladimir, you wanted to feel safe in your home. You wanted to be loved and welcomed. You wanted your attempts to learn and grow and do things on your own to be supported and celebrated. You wanted to be seen and heard for what was authentic in you. You wanted to be asked rather than told. You wanted to see how love, collaboration, and boundaries work together to support everyone in a family and in a community.

2. Engage in supportive community

Next, you express gratitude for the community of support that you have already set up in this imaginary scenario. The people in Vladimir’s life who truly respond to him from compassion and care rather than from fear or collusion have been called in. The people in your life who do the same for you have been called in. This network is constantly sending love and is available at a moment's notice for offering whatever is needed.

3. Set up a space that supports connection

When Vladimir arrives you set up some agreements. You let him know that your intention is to get to know him and connect with his heart and for him to get to know you and connect with your heart. You tell him that there are few things that will support this intention. They are:

You agree that you both wish for a world in which everyone can be safe, thriving, at peace, and enjoy the acceptance and respect of others.
For this time that you are together, you agree to believe that truly wise and effective action comes from a profound level of connection with life, the life in yourself, and the life in others
- You understand that living this belief means prioritizing the quality of connection over understanding the details or concepts of what is being shared.
- You remind yourselves frequently that when a particular quality of connection is present, the door is opened to mental clarity and creative solutions.
You can and will interrupt each other at any point that you lose a sense of connection. These interruptions are followed by guesses about feelings and needs or particular questions to help you understand the experience of the other and connect to your own.
You both agree to track a sense of mutuality in that one person is not taking more time being heard than the other and also that you are both sharing at more or less equal levels of vulnerability.
You agree to attend to a sense of balance in your time together. For example, you imagine ways to play together, exercise, joke and have light conversation, as well as times of profound sharing, listening, and vulnerability.

All of this manifests in the bubble of timelessness that you are in together and with community.

At some point, you notice that you are near the end of your time together. You know it's the end of your time because you feel settled and connected. You see Vladimir as a person like you with the same needs and longings, with a history of pain, suffering, and joy. You see him as the everchanging complex and unique person he is. And as Vladimir heals with your seeing of him and finds his own sense of self-acceptance and self-respect, he also sees you. When he sees you, he sees all of humanity. He accesses a sense of shared humanity that isn't defined by nationality and isn't trapped in a complex history of fear, injustices, pain, and anger.

4. Identify systems of oppression, invite mourning, and identify specific and doable steps for change

As you and Vladimir discuss his transition back to the time-bound world, you recognize that it will be very challenging for him to maintain the shift in consciousness he has experienced in the face of systems that function from an entirely different consciousness.

You both allow space for morning. You mourn past actions taken from disconnection. You mourn systems that operate from the belief that only the needs of some can be valued or met. You mourn systems that are set up to favor whole groups of individuals over other groups of individuals. You mourn a consciousness of scarcity and competition. You mourn the pain and violence that this consciousness creates.

You let this mourning have its own life and rhythm and then you find that the energy starts to move towards taking action. Creativity and mental clarity expand and flow and you bring your supportive communities together to brainstorm the first steps to changing the systems that you will both return to.

This imaginary scenario was meant to help you invoke the consciousness of Mindful Compassionate Dialogue in this very challenging event. What did you notice as you imagined the scenario with me? What else can you envision? With the consciousness, knowledge, and skills you have, perhaps you can continue this vision by imagining world leaders interacting from this consciousness or imagining people within systems taking concrete action to change those systems. The more thorough and detailed your vision, the closer we come to taking compassionate and wise action in this moment with the resources we have.