나는 compassion 이라는 단어가 영국신문이나 방송에 자주 나타나자 이 단어를 놓고 어떻게 이해를 해야 할 지 처음에 어려웠다. 아는 것 같은 단어지만 한국어로 딱 부러지게 번역이 되어 나오지 않았다. 동정심, 자비, 박애 등등을 떠올렸으나 꼭 그런 것 같지만은 않았다. 지금도 그냥 이 단어를 영어단어로 이해하고 있다.
어떤 분이 미술 공부하러 미국에 가서 처음 지도교수를 만나 한국인의 恨을 자신의 작품에 담겠다고 말하면서 단어가 안나와 이 한 맺힌다의 한을 얘기하다가 willpower 라고 했다가 지도교수가 무슨 말인지 몰라 눈을 똥그랗게 하고 쳐다보더라는 얘기를 해 함께 한참 웃었다.
한국의 학원은 영어로 번역할 필요가 없다. Hagwon 으로 그냥 쓴다. 재벌도 Chaebol 로 표기되어 통용된다. 학원과 재벌은 한국적인 현상이라 오히려 영어로 바꾸면 이상해질까 봐 그냥 쓰는 모양이다. 영어로 표기하면 그 원래 뜻이 훼손되기 때문이리라.
오늘 아침 이 Compassion 이 다시 나의 주위를 끈다. 영국 자유민주당 Liberal Democrat 당수가 된 지 3개월 된 Nick Clegg 가 첫 연설을 하면서 이 단어를 썼다. 자신의 할머니와 어머니가 영국에 정착한 이유가 영국이 Tolerance, Freedom, Compassion 이라는 세 가지 가치를 지니고 있어서였다는 말을 했다. news.bbc.co.uk 에 들어가 politics를 클릭 했더니 놓여진 원고도 보이지 않고 가끔 물을 마시면서 서서 47분을 강연하는 모습이 소리와 함께 나왔다.
이 compassion은 그냥 동정심을 느끼는 것 만아 아니라 다른 사람들의 고통을 약하게 하거나 구제하기 위해 직접 행동에 옮기는 것을 말한다. 종교기관에서 극빈가정의 어린이들을 먹이고 입혀 학교에 보낸다거나 영국여배우 엠마 톰슨이 여성 성매매 조직근절을 위해 노력하는 것 등 실제로 행동하는 것을 compassion 이라고 부를 수 있다.
그래서 pity empathy 들과도 다르다. 사회지도층의 덕목으로 교육시키는 이유에서인지 주로 정치가 종교인 귀족계급들이 사회적으로 취약한 집단을 도와주려 무슨 좋은 행동을 하면 이 단어를 사용한다. 궁극적으로 그 집단을 고통으로부터 해방시키려 하는 것이 compassion 이다.
그런데 능력도 안 되는 개인이 남의 고통을 외면하지 않고 너무 애쓰다보면 자신의 건강을 해치는 수도 있다. 우선 자신을 사랑하는 것이 남의 고통을 외면하지 않고 실제로 도와줄 수 있다는 것을 알게 되는 과정을 소개한 의사의 글도 맞는 말이다.
http://www.libdems.org.uk/conference/liverpool-2008-nick-cleggs-leaders-speech.7755.html
CONFERENCE NEWS
Liverpool 2008: Nick Clegg's Leader's Speech
9 March 2008
Nick Clegg made his first leader's speech to party conference in Liverpool, in which he set out his personal beliefs and the need to change Britain's political system:
My grandmother was a Russian exile.
She fled the Russian revolution as a child, escaping through Europe and finally settling here in Britain.
My mother spent part of her childhood in a Japanese prisoner of war camp in Indonesia.
My mother and my grandmother their lives torn and reshaped by the great wars and upheavals of the twentieth century.
And they found a home in Britain because ours is a nation of tolerance, of freedom, and of compassion.
And what my mother and grandmother endured taught me the extraordinary, precious value of those beliefs.
They understood that beliefs matter. They make all the difference between war and peace. Beliefs shape our world, for better and for worse.
And my family taught me never to give up on problems, and no matter what the odds or opposition, always to seek to do what's right.
And there are problems in Britain today.
Too many.
Families stuck in grinding poverty.
Liberty taken and abused by government officials.
Climate change starting to tighten its deathly grip.
But they aren't problems with the British people.
They're problems faced by the British people.
We are not the problem.
It's the system that's the problem.
A heartfelt lesson about true meaning of compassion
By Astrid Pujari, M.D.
Special to The Seattle Times
Related
What are we really giving when we give?
I met a man in his 20s who had gone through open-heart surgery to have one of the valves in his heart replaced. Within one week, doctors discovered the new valve had a hole in it and had to be exchanged.
The young man came to see me before his second surgery because he wanted to be as healthy as possible for the operation.
As we got to talking, he shared something fascinating. He told me that all his life he had described himself as having a "leaky heart" — that he was someone who was always trying to take away other people's problems. He was the kind of person who would throw himself down in the mud so that another person wouldn't have to step in it.
Interestingly, this young man was convinced that part of the reason his heart valve had burst was because, metaphorically, his heart had been leaking for years. He had taken on people's suffering and tried to live their pain for them, and now it was wearing out his heart.
So we started talking about the meaning of compassion. He told me that he had always thought that being compassionate meant that you took on other people's suffering as your own, with no thought for yourself. Anything less was selfish.
Since his heart surgery, he realized that this idea was wasn't working anymore because his body was breaking down. He had started thinking about compassion in a new way.
"Compassion," he said, "is the most selfish thing in the world. We are all born with the ability to love ourselves. And even though lots of people think that is a bad thing, in fact, that's where compassion starts. Because all the great masters and saints of the world loved themselves. The real difference between them and someone else is how big they defined their 'self'."
The image that came to my mind was of throwing a stone into a lake. Self-love is like the rock we throw into to the water. Like the stone that creates circular ripples, self-love allows us to love everything in the world around us.
When we are being compassionate, we don't just identify with ourselves as the rock. We also see ourselves in the ripples, the lake and the fish swimming in the water. That means that a compassionate person sees both himself and the larger web of life at the same time. Honoring yourself takes on a much bigger meaning.
This doesn't mean you throw yourself in the mud to spare someone else wet feet. Compassion requires self-respect because without it, we can't respect the life around us — which is something this man realized.
Dr. Astrid Pujari is a Seattle M.D. with an additional degree as a medical herbalist; she practices at the Pujari Center and teaches as part of the residency programs at Virginia Mason and Swedish/Cherry Hill hospitals. Send questions to apujari@seattletimes.com for possible use in future columns. All information is intended for education and not a substitute for medical advice. Consult your doctor before following any suggestions given here.
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