An uplifting experience

“You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view, until you climb inside of his skin and walk around in it." -Harper Lee, To Kill a Mockingbird


This summer, while enjoying an amazing philosophy workshop on the good life according to Socrates, Plato, Aristotle and Aquinas, I also got a lesson in virtue from teachers who didn’t even know they were at work.

The college where my group was meeting was also holding a “come and see” weekend retreat for prospective students. So for a week, at breakfast, lunch and dinner us middle-aged men shared a dining room with high school seniors. Over the first couple of days, in the sea of animated teenagers enjoying their experience on a college campus, I found myself observing a young man in a wheelchair. And throughout the week I kept returning to him, watching him, wondering about him and his story. So young to be wheel-chair bound; what had happened, when did it happen, and how was he coping with it? To walk onto a college campus is daunting enough; what must it be like to have to roll on to one?

I was moved by his witness to courage, and desire, and engagement, and perseverance. I prayed for him. I was sympathetic. And I remained at a distance.

The last morning of my retreat, as I prepared to go down to breakfast, I heard loud chatter in the quad where the students were all gathering to go on a hike. All? My mind wondered about the young man in the chair. I walked outside so I could survey the whole group. And in a corner of the lawn where the students were congregating, I saw a most remarkable scene unfolding.

There, seated in a big wing-back chair was the young man, watching with a huge smile on his face as six of his confreres excitedly altered his wheelchair. They’d found two large wooden poles from God-knows-where, and had carefully placed them under the chair. Then they’d attached these poles to the chair with rope for stability. And finally they placed the young man into his “new” wheelchair, gently secured him, firmly grasped the poles, and slowly lifted.

“Let’s go,” they yelled, re-joining the larger group. And together everyone set off down the trail, the young man being carried along right smack in the middle of the pack.

No one was left behind.

For a week I had watched and cared for this young man from a distance….that’s sympathy. His peers had watched, and then cared for him up close…that’s empathy. I wondered about this young man and his plight, they got to know him and his life. I hoped he would not be left behind, they made sure of it. Sympathy is good. Empathy is better.

Empathy asks you to step into someone else’s shoes, walk around in them for awhile, and then step back out and do something meaningful for that person with the knowledge you’ve gathered. It’s the stuff of saints…who happen to be, on occasion, philosophers too.

Studying Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, and Aquinas for a week was valuable. But just one moment watching a young man, and the human soul, being elevated by the virtue of empathy was priceless.

Question for reflection: What prevents you from stepping into the shoes of others, seeing things from their perspective, and then doing something meaningful for them with the information gathered?