I’ve been fascinated recently by the dichotomy between concept and emotion. We can know and believe in an idea without feeling its truth just as we can feel without knowing. What’s more, it’s possible to realize within ourselves a certain distance between the concept and virtue of something, e.g. compassion, and its lived experience.
Earlier this week, I was gratified in being able to clearly express this distance to a physician. This idea was brought forth within a larger conversation about well-being and meditation, specifically in the challenge of feeling compassion for those who show little regard for others or differ significantly in core values. These “challenging” people might be politically polarizing or perhaps just plain mean. Most of us can understand how compassion in this case is both virtuous yet difficult–a distance so tangible there is a possibility to cause harm and/or trauma within yourself in extending such compassion across the chasm to say, someone who’s caused you abuse.
With self-compassion in mind, to take time and intention to close this gap seems worthwhile. I’ve attempted to do this exercise myself in the form of Metta meditation. Metta roughly translates to “loving-kindness” in Pali and is, in my understanding of the term, a feeling of wishing well onto others in an unattached manner. Furthermore, it is related to and among three other Buddhist virtues–karuṇā, muditā, and upekkhā (compassion, sympathetic joy, and equanimity in Pali, respectively). Unlike the more familiar forms of observational meditation, which focus on e.g., the breath or awareness itself, Metta meditation is an intention form, a way to cultivate and increase one’s ability to experience a particular mental state.
My n=1 experience has shown that with consistent practice it is indeed possible to increase my own sense of compassion toward myself and others. Additionally this mental state feels “good,” in the sense that there’s a certain pleasure in genuinely wishing well onto others within your mind. People on guided meditation apps and videos describe the feeling as warm and expansive as well as the feeling that it reduces one’s self-concern. These descriptors seem accurate to me. I imagine it almost like what I would expect how being on MDMA would feel, without the side-effects or “come down.”
In practicing Metta, it is easy to wonder: is the cultivation of this state just a form of self-interested navel-gazing (which I would argue its inherent benefit to one’s own well-being is reason enough to practice) or is there actual concrete good being done to oneself and others as a result? The answer is, I believe, is yes, there is “real” good, but it is complex.
Closing the gap between concept and emotion has no inherent moral utility if we don’t do anything with the result. Indeed much as been already written about the difference between caring and actually doing good, notably Peter Singer’s concept,”effective altruism,” and Paul Bloom’s work on the pitfalls of empathy. As long as there is honest engagement with such criticisms, it seems there is salient value in actually feeling as opposed to only conceptualizing the virtues of compassion. The most noticeable value in my own life is that there is a tendency to treat oneself and others with more genuine kindness if you feel compassionate in the moment. Lofty goals of morality aside, this is the realized benefit of the practice in everyday situations. Perhaps one can say compassion shouldn’t be highlighted to the exclusion of other “good” emotional states of consciousness, but it is arguably a foundational one that most if not all people could benefit from cultivating more in their lives.