text: Compassion Resilience - RedRover
  In these difficult and turbulent times, it's worth thinking about ways to deal with adversity. In 2017, I wrote about compassion resilience as the ability to maintain your physical, emotional, and mental well-being while responding compassionately to the suffering of others. This article contains some good ideas on how to manage difficulties that you might find useful in this time of pandemic and unrest. – Beth Gammie
  Manage your own reactions—don't let others or situations run you
  Once you understand that it is your own thoughts about what happened that determine your experience, you move from being at the mercy of others' actions to being in control of yourself. In short, if a person or situation drives you crazy, quit handing them the "car keys" to your emotional well-being.
  This involves being able to see a purpose, a meaning, that sustains you, no matter how difficult or horrible the situation appears. If you are suffering but find meaning in a situation, then you won't despair—a nice way of saying you will have resilience.
  You do wonders for your compassion resilience—for your ability to remain well when caring for others—by simply taking care of yourself. Your physical and emotional well-being requires care and attention—and you know well enough the things to do: eat well, get enough sleep, exercise and spend time with friends. If you aren't doing these things, the question to ask yourself is, "Why not?"
  When dealing with someone difficult—remember you're dealing with that person's best coping mechanism
  When you are doing animal welfare work and experience others' anger, verbal attacks and ridicule, you are experiencing the effects of that person's best way to cope with their difficult situation. It may not be that person's best behavior, but it's the best they can manage right now. It doesn't make their reaction right, just more understandable.
  "Radical kindness" means being kind to someone for no other reason than that as a living being, they deserve it. It is an expression of our highest nature.
  This can be a challenging concept, and for us animal lovers it might help to remember that people are animals, too. We work so hard for animals, love them, show them kindness—because they deserve it, and for no other reason. People, even the difficult ones, deserve our kindness. As the saying goes, "Be kind, for everyone you meet is fighting a hard battle. Everyone is struggling on some level or another."
  This article originally appeared as "The Flip Side of Fatigue" in Animal Sheltering magazine (November/December 2015), The Humane Society of the United States.