Session 3

Spring 2008

“Firing Mr. Fix-It”  

Opening Words

“If it is language that makes us human, one half of language is to listen. Silence can exist without speech, but speech cannot live without silence. Listen to the speech of others. Listen even more to their silences.” - - Jacob Trapp

Chalice Lighting

As we light this chalice, may our hearts be open to both the words and the silences we share within one another.

Check-in/Sharing

Topic and Questions

In her book Kitchen Table Wisdom, Rachel Naomi Remen, who is both a medical doctor and a therapist, tells a story about Dieter, a man suffering from cancer, and his doctor. "Every week he would go to the doctor’s office for his injection," Remens says. Afterwards he and his doctor would sit together and talk quietly for a while. Fifteen minutes, no more. Until he came to a patient support group his doctor was the only person to whom he could talk honestly, who understood the experiences that he was going through. Cancer had changed his life. He now lived so far beyond the usual, the normal, the ordinary in life, that he often felt alone. Many people did not want to hear about how it was with him, or couldn’t understand things that had never happened to them. Some were so upset by the pain of it all that he felt the need to protect them from it through his silence. But his doctor understood. For fifteen minutes every week he was able to talk to somebody who listened, who didn’t need him to explain, who was not afraid...

“[But] for some time now,” Remen says, “Dieter had suspected that the chemotherapy was no longer helping him. Convinced at last of this, he spoke to his doctor and suggested that the treatments be stopped. He asked if he could come every week just to talk. His doctor responded abruptly, "If you refuse chemotherapy, there is nothing more I can do for you," he said....

Dieter later said to a group of fellow patients..."My doctor’s love is as important to me as his chemotherapy, but he does not know."

Coincidentally, the doctor also happened to be Remen’s patient in therapy. Week after week, from the depths of chronic depression, he would tell his therapist that "no one cared about him, he didn’t matter to anyone, he was just another white coat in the hospital, a mortgage payment to his wife, a tuition payment to his son. No one would notice if he vanished as long as someone was there to make rounds or take out the garbage." 

            In his book The Active Life, Parker Palmer tells a related story. He says that twice in his life he experienced deep depression. "Both times various friends tried to rescue me with well-intended encouragement and advice," he said. "In the midst of my depression I had a friend who took a different tack. Every afternoon around four o’clock he came to me, sat me in a chair, removed my shoes, and massaged me feet. He hardly said a word, but he was there, he was with me. He was a lifeline for me, a link to the human community and thus to my own humanity. He had no need to ‘fix’ me. He knew the meaning of compassion."

            Similarly, Margaret Wheatley tells the story of a young, black South African woman who was sitting in a circle of women from many nations, and each woman had the chance to tell a story from her life. When her turn came, she began to quietly tell a story of true horror - - of how she had found her grandparents slaughtered in their village. Many of the women were Westerners, and in the presence of such pain they instinctively wanted to do something. They wanted to fix, to make it better, anything to remove the pain of this tragedy from such a young life. The young woman felt their compassion, but also felt them closing in. She put her hands up, as if to push back their desire to help. She said, “I don’t need you to fix me. I just need you to listen to me.”

1. What reflections do you have about these stories?

2. What do you make of Dieter’s physician not understanding his value to Dieter? What do you make of the woman in Margaret Wheatley’s story saying, “I don’t need you to fix me. I just need you to listen to me” ?  What do you make of Parker Palmer saying, “He knew the meaning of compassion.”

3. Has there been a time in your life when somebody else has tried to “fix” you? What was that like?

4. Is there somebody in your life you are tempted to “fix?” What is that like?

5. When we face somebody having a problem, our temptation is often either to try to “fix the other person” or to run away. Why do you think this is?” What makes offering a compassionate presence difficult?

6. Who are better listeners, men or women? How does this affect the relationship between women and men, between women and women, or between men and men?

Like and Wishes

Reflections on the Empty Chair

Remember to reflect on the empty seat and think of whom you might invite to participate in Chalice Circles!

Extinguishing the Chalice

As we extinguish this chalice, may we continue to hold one another in our hearts until we are able to come together again.

Closing Words

“At times our own light goes out and is rekindled by a spark from another person. Each of us has cause to think with deep gratitude of those who have lighted the flame within us.” - - Albert Schweitzer