Fires and Compassion?

There is a massive fire. The flames are so close that you can hear the crackling, feel the heat. You are being evacuated; driving away you see a person on foot, also trying to get away. 

Do you stop and offer them a ride?

The line of cars leaving the fire is long, traffic is moving slowly. A person taps on your window asking for a ride to safety.

Do you make room? Pushing aside some of the few household possessions you managed to gather and give this person a ride?

Do you ignore them?

Do you turn them away assuming the next person will have more space?

What if you are the person running for your life?

Last week, that person was my sister. The fire, the Almeda fire in Southern Oregon, swept through her neighborhood and the that of several others. The fire was in sight when she started out on foot because she had loaned her car to her son so he could go to work. He couldn’t get back to her because he was on the other side of the fire.

My sister walked for 2 miles before someone FINALLY had enough compassion to give her a ride. My sister could see the fire, could hear the crackling, could feel the heat. She asked several people for a ride. None would make room, too occupied with their own lives, concerned that they would have to leave some of their “stuff” on the side of the road if they picked up a human being.

At this point in time, authorities still don’t know how many homes were lost due to the Almeda fire, (which is still only 50% contained at the time of this article). In fact, they don’t know how many lives may have been lost and they won’t know for a while. What they do know is that the entire downtown area of my sister’s city and the one just north of hers are gone. 

Some of those people that drove past my sister were business owners, some managers, some employees, some unemployed. Some were housewives, some single, but every one of them was a human being, like my sister, Jill.

How does this impact us, in other states, other countries? As leaders, we have an opportunity to bring more compassion into our working environment. When we show compassion, it provides people with a model from which our employees, colleagues and clients can learn. This model can become a compass.

NO HUMAN, man, woman, child, black, white, brown, gay, straight, Muslim, Christian, Atheist, or other, should face the fear that may sister faced last week. Compassion is the only way that we are going to find our humanity again. Compassion leads us back to love. Love for self and love for others, the kind of love that leads to human connection. 

If you are in a leadership role, and even if you aren’t, take a good look at yourself and ask yourself, are you living your life in a way that demonstrates your core values? Do you know what your core values are? Have you explored that idea recently? Given all that has been happening in 2020, it is a good time to get crystal clear about what is important to you. It is a good time to embrace COMPASSION.

My sister made it out alive thanks to a small, elderly woman that pulled over and told a stranger, my sister, to get in the car.

Think about that….