Compassion pisses me off.

When it comes to compassion, people are the ultimate testers, and the closer they are in your circle to you, they more they will test it and make you want to rip out chunks of your hair and toss compassion out the window!  I don’t’ know how that happens and I’m not asking now ( DO YOU HEAR ME UNIVERSE!!??! ATTENTION! I AM OFFICIALLY NOT ASKING "WHY?"!) For me, it's easier to have compassion for the harried carhop at Sonic that I see every morning (*waves* Hi Brandi!)  than it is for me to have compassion for the co-worker making snarky remarks about co-workers. It's much easier to have compassion for people who aren’t in your immediate circle than it is to have compassion for people you talk to on a daily basis. Although my husband shows great compassion for me when I overload the dishwasher. ("And leave lights on. And don’t do your laundry. And...." he compassionately added.)

Anyway...Fairy of Great Compassion arrived at my apartment door recently, along with the Bad Nasty Entitlement Fairy. Both of those Fairies make tough guests. I love them for existing. I hate them when I'm dealing with them--much like dieting and litter boxes.

A few weeks ago, I sat down and had a conversation with someone in my community who had sent me a snarky, hate filled message on Facebook. They were angry that no one had reached out to them to check on them and they'd been going through a rough time--yet no one knew the extent of it. I pointed out that many had been very kind and supportive of them in the instances of when they'd reached out via email or social media. Yet, this person felt that they shouldn't have to reach out and let us know they were suffering--it should simply be something that the community did on its own accord: seek, discover, absolve the nasty business going on. More importantly, it was something that I as a High Priestess of the community, should have had on my radar to do: a.) Notice that t person hadn't been on social media for a few days and check up on them. b.) Reach out when seeing that the person was having a bad time--by phone, or in person. A comment on Facebook, no matter how supportive, did not cut it. They were not in my close social circle. I wasn't aware that they expected this of me. Even if I were aware, I'm not sure I would do it--with 300 to 500 people in my general community, I'm not in a position to notice if one disappears from the internet for a few days. I am also not a therapist or a social worker. I work hard at a job I hate and might like to work on my own projects once in awhile. I simply can't do it all, but I do the best that I can. 

With that, we talked about Entitlement.

"How dare you call me entitled???" They fired back. "After all I've been through! You sit there in a comfortable home with money to spare and you call ME ENTITLED?”

And I realized I’d given one of the nastiest insults one can to someone born after Generation X--a mistake from which there is no return, only blog posts to hopefully better explain it to other people.

Entitlement: the word people in the generation above mine throw at the generation after mine, calling them entitled for "thinking things should be handed to them," whereas Millennials respond, "We're more thinking we shouldn't have this much debt at this age." I'm stuck in a weird place as a Gen X and before the Millennials, so I don't feel like anyone was talking to me.

And, in this person, I was faced with a manifestation of myself from just a few  years ago—when my grandfather died.

When news reached my social circles (2006, so Facebook wasn’t my main form of communication), outpourings of love and support came at me from every angle. Long-lost friends texted and people I hadn’t seen in years showed up at his funeral. My world had just ended.

But a couple of weeks later, I was back in college and it was like it never existed.

I was a poster-child for Toby Keith’s song, “I wanna talk about me!”

A summary of messages/calls from people in the aftermath: 
"Just take it easy. Go for a walk or something." "I lost my dog Bingo...so; I know EXACTLY what you're going through." "What in the world could still be the matter? It’s time to move on; he’s in a better place."

Me: Well...he was my hero.
I can’t focus to study.
I want to talk to him so bad and I hurt so bad and there's not a friggin' thing I can do about any of it.
I have to go to work and school and be a mom because no one cares about my emotional state.
I'm not trained to cope with this sh*t and here I am coping with this sh*t...

EVERYTHING'S NOT FINE. 

I got mad. How dare the world move on and think about things like elections, their own jobs, their own problems, or anything other than what I was going through? How dare people minimize what I was dealing with? How people talk about the loss of my grandfather without ever having known him? I had a lot to say. Why didn't anyone ask me? Had those people who checked in on me obsessively or posted about their "Friend Angela has suffered a terrible loss" only been in it for some kind of sensational drama in the moment? Strange how "into my well-being" they were when the action was going on....odd how they seemed to have forgotten it was something they cared about, only a few days later.

I got madder, and then I got bitter, and then resentful.

Maybe because I just got tired of being angry. Maybe because when trying to counsel others through the same thing, one has to take a step ahead and fix thyself first before going around and helping others fix thy own selves. But the final nail came when I was told I'd done wrong by another person by not fulfilling the role they thought I should. I finally accepted that I really wasn't owed the attention I thought I deserved back then, either.

Had the multitudes of casual online acquaintances ever promised they would come running to check on me? How many times had I given a public, fleeting glance at serious things that were happening in other places--maybe even tossed a few Sabbat collections one way or another--but then went on about my business again? Lots and lots.

I counted my blessings. I had my mom and grandmother. I had my husband and children. I deepened friendships with people currently in my world. And I took a look, a long hard look at my own entitlement.

We tend to treat the word "entitled" like an insult or a character flaw. It shouldn't be the former and it isn't the latter. It's an ailment on the soul. When we think we are owed something that we are actually not, we suffer and we cause others to suffer. When we assume others will act in accordance to how we think they should act, we are often let down and we suffer. Groups, Covens, friends, partners--there is an agreement, generally spoken but sometimes not--that support will be shared when it is required. That one's needs will be met without there being an ask. Yet, we can't apply this to everyone we meet and we certainly can't apply it to "the general population." Once we can get out from under the vise-grip of baseless "I deserved...it should be...they should have...it should be..." and focus on what we truly received, we can soar just a little higher on our spiritual broomsticks.

In the mirror of me embodied in this angry, hurt person then sitting before me, I found a glimpse of my own Entitlement leech. I also found compassion because we both knew what that leech's bite felt like. I found compassion for the people I thought ignored me. They hadn't--they were just living their lives and they didn't owe me anything. I dug just a little deeper into my own Well of Compassion again and this time, found even a little more freedom from spiritual slavery, just like the Goddess promised. 

I am thankful for this lesson.

But what I wonder about, are the other people around me, who drag around their own sense of entitlement. Who are invited to parties that clearly state on the invitation “bring a munchies to share and your own alcohol of choice”, and who show up with nothing in hand, yet expecting to partake fully of everyone else’s contributions.

I wonder about the people around me who refuse to get a job, any job, but whine and cry that their “art” isn’t completely supporting them. There are thousands of talented people out there that can’t support themselves solely on their art, yet they have jobs to support themselves and support their purchase of art supplies, ever mindful that they need to be continually plugging away at their bliss.

Then there are those people who I don’t wonder about. The leeches. The ones who find out that you’re in charge of the annual Fundraiser, and not only do they expect free tickets for entry, but complimentary drink tickets too! These are the same people who sneak alcohol into the same fundraiser because they don’t want to pay the “outrageous prices” at the bar. Never mind that it could cost the venue their liquor license. Those people, are just leeches.

I’ve found that the more entitled the person feels, the less true compassion they have, for anyone.  

What I’ve learned since my grandfather’s passing is that I really do try to take ownership of my shit. If I can’t afford to go out, I don’t. If a friend of mine takes me out for dinner or drinks, then I try to reciprocate as much as possible. If I know people who are involved in fundraising events that I want to attend, then I offer to help in any way possible. If they don’t need my help, I try to go anyway, because I enjoy supporting worthy causes.  If I want to go off chasing windmills, then I’ll finance it myself.

I don’t think I’m ever going to meditate on entitlement and compassion again. It pisses me off.

But I think my next meditation will be on the Mysteries of Chocolate and Wine.