Overcoming Compassion Fatigue

Elgin Davis

Published in

Winter Hearth Studios

7 min readJul 5, 2019

Volume 1, Issue 9: Overcoming Compassion Fatigue

(Originally Published March 31, 2019)

What’s New This Week

Welcome back and thanks for joining us again in the Winter Hearth Epic Life Playbook, where each week we explore the human experience through different mediums, gleaning useful and practical insights to become socially and emotionally powerful.

Following the previous digest on Rest and Recovery , the theme of this week’s content is Overcoming Compassion Fatigue. If you’ve seen any form of news at any point in time, you’re probably familiar with the fact that there’s no shortage of terrible events happening around the world. Tragedy strikes day after day, and whether you realize it or not, each of these events you learn about and care about has an effect on you in some way, shape, or form.

Though many of you have awesome, huge hearts, our compassion is sadly not unlimited and does indeed come with a cost. Compassion fatigue is generally defined as a unique form of burnout, characterized by a gradual lessening of compassion as a result of constant engagement with heavy emotional situations and challenges (Jennifer R. Day & Ruth A. Anderson, 2011). In other words, compassion fatigue may be described as the process of becoming desensitized to people who are suffering or are in need of help. The phenomenon is exaggerated and most commonly observed within the caregiving professions, because workers in these professions face constant “heart-wrenching, emotional challenges” (Compassion Fatigue Awareness Project, 2019), such as those who deal with death and mortality on a daily basis (doctors, firefighters, police officers, etc.). There has also been some argument among journalism analysts suggesting that news media have played a large part in dramatically increasing compassion fatigue throughout our society by utilizing stories of extreme tragedy and suffering outside of their proper contexts.

In short, caring comes with a cost. If you feel like you have some degree of compassion fatigue, you’re certainly not alone. The great thing is that there are plenty of ways by which you can start to overcome compassion fatigue once the initial awareness is present. Check out this week’s content to learn more about compassion fatigue and to learn exactly what you need to do to overcome yours.

Listen

This week, we’re back with Oprah and another SuperSoul conversation. In this episode, Oprah speaks with Cynthia Bond, author of the best-selling book “Ruby”, which deals with the heavy topic of sexual abuse. Bond talks about how she uses writing to process emotions and experiences, and also to tell a powerful story that has hit home for many readers. I’ve yet to read the book, but I’m definitely adding it to my list.

The conversation also brings us back to the idea of compassion fatigue in the sense that reading emotionally heavy, dense material can wear down on a person’s mental health if they aren’t aware of the effects of the content being consumed. The same idea applies to music, film, art, and anything else we consume. That is, of course, not to say that we shouldn’t engage with emotionally powerful material, but rather to shed light on the fact that these things affect us in ways that we might not readily perceive, and that we must become more aware of these subtle effects in order to care for ourselves properly and maintain a solid mental health state.

Without further ado, here’s the conversation with Oprah and Cynthia Bond!

Learn

In this week’s Learn section, I want to provide you with a number of links to TED Talks concerning Compassion Fatigue:

These talks do a good job of defining compassion fatigue and where it occurs most often, and they even give a few tips for combatting this increasingly-common form of burnout in today’s society.

Level Up

In this week’s Level Up section, we have an article published in Psychology Today, further outlining compassion fatigue and giving concrete steps for dealing with this sneaky form of burnout. I will outline below the steps recommended by Dr. Beth Hundall Stamm, one of the world’s leading experts on compassion fatigue, and Dr. Amit Sood, a current Professor of Medicine at Mayo Clinic College of Medicine:

Enhance your awareness with education
Accept where you are on your path at all times
Exchange information and feelings with people who can validate you
Clarify your personal boundaries — what works for you and what doesn’t
Be kind to yourself
Express what you need verbally
Take positive action to change your environment
Limit the amount of daily news you watch or read about
Try to comes to terms with the fact that pain and suffering are realities of life over which we have little or no control
Be grateful for what is good in your life and in the world
Try to find some meaning in the suffering you see
If you must blame something, blame the situation, not the person
Show compassion to yourself by being kind, soothing, and comforting to yourself

Fireside Spotlight

In last week’s Fireside Spotlight, we checked out the demo for Mopboy, a new desktop game created by our fellow Firestarters, CakeZero. This week, we’ll see a piece from Winter Hearth Studios, inspired by the recent trip to Barcelona. The piece is entitled La Sagrada Familia, and is named after the famous, under-construction temple being built in the northern part of the city. The building has actually been under construction for 100+ years, but it’s expected to finally be completed (long after its initial architect and designer has passed) around the year 2026.

La Sagrada Familia

Alighting sweetly from the several stories above,
Each saint takes his turn swaying in the
Cherished, cheery light of the
Stained-glass windows;

Filtering the rays of the sun as they tell
The story of the raise of the Son from
The calamity of unknown yet certain death into
The calmness of unbounded, everlasting life.

The great temple stands tall — mighty, yet unfinished.

Seafoam-green shards of light
Dash the ground in a dizzying spell,
While cherry-red drops trickle down from the
Solid, rose-colored treetops

Which provide no shade, for the
Truest light emanates from below the unmoving trees.
Fastened tightly with nails of injustice,
The granite Son shines from beneath the stone.

Spires reach toward the heavens
Like a distress beacon, casting lamentations
Destined to fall upon deaf ears.
Destined to drift upward into the frigid void.

Truth, hollow as the sanctuary halls,
Truth, hallowed as the art of sacrifice;
Nothing good comes without sacrifice.
Nothing worthwhile comes without a paid price.

Forevermore, there will be another block to be laid,
Another brick to be placed, another request to be made,
Another flourish to be carved, another story to be told,
Another light to be shone, and another stone to be rolled.

-Elgin Davis

Walk It, Talk it

Thanks again for joining us this week in the Winter Hearth Epic Life Playbook! In the words of Dale Carnegie, “Knowledge isn’t power until it is applied.” How can you apply the ideas in this digest to your life? How can you use it to gain power in living a more epic story? Talk to your friends and family this week about something you found interesting in the digest.

This weekly personal development playbook is a labor of love, so if you enjoy reading it each week, please share it with your friends to assist us in reaching our goal of helping the world achieve a better human experience :)

Your Greatest Chapter Awaits

Until next time,
Elgin

Hey, I’m Elgin, and I love to create. I’m the creator of Winter Hearth Studios and the Winter Hearth Epic Life Journal, a space where we explore the depths of the human experience, discovering the keys to crafting a better life and inspiring you to Live An Epic Story.

I’m currently a 4th year student at Harvard University studying computer science and design, and in my free time I love to travel, draw, read, and pursue bold, exciting adventures.