SALTINES AND MUSTARD: MY RECIPE FOR COMPASSION
Do you have a person in your life who has the ability to make even the simplest things difficult? A person who likes to cause problems on perfectly good days. A person who finds fault with every good thing. They attempt to make birthdays and holidays miserable. They need to be the victim in all situations. They disregard, knock down, climb over or under every boundary you ever set up.
Well I do.
It’s challenging to say the least. It robs me of my joy some days and takes a lot of focus to keep myself in a place of feeling good. But I’m getting better and faster at refocusing myself into a better place utilizing some, or all, of the mental tools I have compiled over the years.
One of the tools I use is compassion.
In discussing this person with a friend who knows them well, I was informed that they didn’t have a great upbringing and the stories of their childhood makes my heart break. For example, a common meal at their house was saltines and mustard. That’s it. That’s all there was.
Remembering that stops me in my anger tracks every time. Or at least slows my anger train down as I continue to repeat it to myself... saltines and mustard, saltines and mustard, saltines and mustard, and helps me step on to the compassion train.
It helps me understand how it might be possible for the person to have certain behaviors. It doesn’t excuse bad behavior, it doesn’t make everything better, it doesn’t make me happier or make the problems suddenly go away. What it does do is help me to calm down, not take things personally and restore my peace.
If I had the childhood this person had I would have turned out differently. If all there was to eat on a regular basis was saltines and mustard I would have turned out differently. If I didn’t get the love and affection all humans need I would have turned out differently. If I didn’t have stability or safety I would have turned out differently.
Now, many people have horrible childhoods and become amazing people, and some people are given every good thing and somehow become not great people. Everybody has a story and they make us who we are, good or bad. The thing I try to remember is that sometimes we see a person’s past trauma and sometimes we don’t.
I do my best not to make assumptions in life but I make an exception when I don’t understand someone’s behavior, or put more honestly, when someone’s behavior throws me into an angry tailspin. I just assume that if I knew their whole story, I would understand their behavior better. I imagine that if I knew their story I would instantly have compassion for them and not take their behavior personally.
This doesn’t mean that I feel sorry for them and take my boundaries down and give them whatever they want. Absolutely not, ever. It means that I can have boundaries and compassion. I can be angered and love anyway. I can choose not to take things personally and maintain my peace and joy.
I can remember that I, too, have a story and past trauma and my behaviors baffle someone else! It may not be saltines and mustard, and for a time in my life I didn’t even know what part of my story was, but it was there and it was directing some of my choices and behaviors. So I can have compassion for myself too, and now that I know better, I choose better.
The person in my life doesn’t seem to have that mindset, but when I remember saltines and mustard I have compassion for that missing piece too.