Zen trainer Jules Shuzen Harris teaches us a three-step follow to attach with and serve those that are struggling. Illustrations by Carole Hénaff.
In occasions of doubt, disbelief, and insecurity, the follow of bearing witness may be an vital side of our consciousness and presence.
Bearing witness may be outlined as acknowledging that one thing exists or is true. From a Buddhist perspective, and particularly the Zen Peacemakers Order, to bear witness is to embrace each the enjoyment and the struggling we encounter. Relatively than merely observing the state of affairs, we turn out to be the state of affairs. We turn out to be intimate with no matter it’s—starvation, poverty, discrimination, illness, or loss of life.
Bearing witness invokes a way of interconnectedness, a direct realization of the wholeness of life.
After we analyze and choose a state of affairs, we usually come to it with all of our concepts and ordinary beliefs. We’re solely capable of see it via the lens of our conditioned pondering. However after we shift to the follow of bearing witness, we droop our analytical pondering and transfer to a spot of open consciousness. This permits the witnessing presence to turn out to be one with no matter state of affairs we encounter.
To bear witness, we have to put aside the deal with our personal reactions and enter a spot of stillness and receptivity. Bearing witness on the planet, we’re cultivating the identical floor of open coronary heart and thoughts that we follow in our meditation.
This brings us to the query, “What’s the good thing about bearing witness follow?”
Psychologically, it allows us to attach with a spot of actual empathy. It additionally supplies a form of catharsis, a launch from our emotional reactions of pity, disgrace, or worry.
Spiritually, bearing witness invokes a way of interconnectedness, of oneness, a direct realization of the wholeness of life.
Politically and socially, it allows us to see clearly your complete internet of causes and circumstances that create struggling, and to take efficient motion to enhance folks’s lives.
Here’s a three-step follow of bearing witness that you are able to do:
1. Determine Who Wants You
First, determine an individual or a bunch who’s disenfranchised or who’s struggling. Their state of affairs is perhaps one thing acquainted to us, linked to one thing we ourselves have skilled, or it could possibly be one thing completely unfamiliar to us, bringing a brand new edge to our consciousness and understanding.
2. Be There and Be Empty
Second, spend significant time with them. It is a time to let go of what we got here with, and study and pay attention. You may do a avenue retreat with the homeless. You may volunteer at a drug rehab clinic, take part in jail outreach work, or present help to sufferers and/or households in a hospice middle. You would participate within the voluntary providers provided to veterans by the VA program.
Central to this step is coming from a spot of vacancy, approaching it with willingness to turn out to be actually intimate with one other’s expertise. Bearing witness requires a form of psychological and bodily give up to the state of affairs to permit it to totally enter into your consciousness.
3. Serve the Scenario
After a while, ask your self, “How can I most acknowledge folks’s plight?” If they’re hungry, do I serve them a meal or do I provide you with a manner of serving to them to feed and shelter themselves? I’d say sure, it’s best to do each. To bear witness is to embrace and acknowledge the entire state of affairs. On a private stage, you feed them. On a systemic stage, you interact the system.
If there was ever a time after we wanted to bear witness, it’s now.
There are lots of ways in which witnessing can turn out to be an lively expression of our consciousness and our empathy. Proper the place we dwell, the town council, the mayor’s workplace, governors, or legislative meeting may be introduced into this recognition of what’s calling out for consideration. On the federal stage, your congressional consultant or federal companies may be held accountable to their duties. Our private witness consists of supporting organizations which are pushing for laws and insurance policies that tackle human struggling and that promote peace and justice.
In a cultural anthropology class I took years in the past, I discovered in regards to the notion of cultural upkeep, which describes how a tradition, as a system, defends itself even when it means disguising the reality or absorbing what that tradition perceives as threats. Bearing witness is a radical act—it’s a manner of shining a lightweight on the reality and standing steadfastly in that gentle.
The follow of bearing witness isn’t straightforward, but when there was ever a time after we wanted to bear witness, it’s now. Gone are the times when it was sufficient to march within the streets to result in social change. Every of us known as upon to maneuver past our personal fastened views and open our eyes to penetrate to the true actuality of the world as it’s.
