What the World Needs Now: The Power of Accompaniment
Who helps you face the hardships of Life?
On the day after Thanksgiving, my cousin and I delivered our grandmother’s eulogy at her Celebration of Life service. Her early life was marked by tragedy: the death of both of her parents within a year of the other. I have repeatedly wondered: What was it that helped her face this profound loss? Co-creating her eulogy offered an answer: accompaniment.
Accompaniment is defined as “going somewhere with someone.” Sometimes we literally companion someone on a journey to a place: “Will you go with me to my doctor’s appointment?” Sometimes it is the practice of listening and affirming another’s story, experiences and emotions. Accompaniment can help us face hard realities and traumatic events. Although my grandmother was orphaned, she wasn’t alone. She was accompanied by her grandparents, her neighbors, her church and her God of Abiding Love, which in turn led her into a lifelong practice of accompanying others.
At LeaderWise, we teach that accompaniment is a practice of human resilience. It’s what Laura van Dernoot Lipsky calls a microculture of support in Trauma Stewardship. It is a community who nurtures the well-being of its members through thick and thin: “Its members must be people we can debrief with, laugh with, brainstorm with, consult with, cry with, and become better people with.”
When it comes to responding to traumatic experience, Van Dernoot Lipsky references the wisdom of Marten W. deVries in Traumatic Stress: “Culture cannot prevent calamity, nor can it blunt the immediate physical power of violence and the emotional shock of betrayal. It can only help with building up resilience before such events, or with providing validation, restitution, and rehabilitation afterward.” Both before and after traumas of life, these are communities who practice accompaniment. They know the tremendous power in showing up. [In fact, isolation, says van Dernoot Lipskey, is a form of oppression!] Not only do microcultures show up for you, they teach you how to show up for others. They create promises of reciprocity. What we’re currently seeing in the neighborhoods of the Twin Cities is a re-claiming of neighbors as a microculture of support. Showing up means crossing historic lines of tribe, religion, race, and ethnicity in order to center the relationship of neighbors as primary.
Furthermore, microcultures create experiences of almost inherent belonging, both in the present and over time. Through the practice of storytelling and singing together, these communities help members place themselves in the longer story of human existence. Personally, I have noticed stories emerging of neighbors across time ~ for instance in the abolition movement of the nineteenth century, who stood against violence against their neighbors (even by neighbors who were anti-abolitionist).
Take a moment to journal, reflecting on your responses to these questions:
Who are your models of accompaniment in your life? How did they practice it?
Who makes up your microcultures of support? How do they practice accompaniment?
How have they accompanied you through difficult times in your life?
How have you accompanied others? How might you practice accompaniment?
Over the last few years, I have been connected to people directly affected by crises ~ friends in Asheville after Hurricane Helene, family in the CA fires, colleagues in the Twin Cities ~ and wondered how best to accompany them. Here are a few practices that have made a difference:
Reach out. (It matters.) Countless people have shared how much it meant when even long lost friends touched base with them: “I heard the news, and I’m thinking about you. If you need to process, call anytime.” Practice: Who might you reach out to today?
Spend time with people who get it. Asheville friends shared conversations they had with others who had experienced their own environmental devastation. These friends listened and affirmed their experience: “No, you are not crazy. Your feelings are normal. I get it.” Practice: How might you show up and create space to listen to others who are facing similar situations to your own life experiences? (Note: Boundaries in #4 below.)
Prioritize downtime for noticing. We are a society that responds by doing. Slowing down long enough and regularly enough to notice how we are doing is critical for long-term well-being. Pausing can be uncomfortable, but tending to the daily discomfort is better than a complete breakdown after years of neglect. Practice: Begin your week with LeaderWise’s contemplative centering.
Tend to your own well-being. For people and communities who accompany, practices for self-renewal and setting healthy boundaries are also vital. Don’t skip sabbath. Don’t forego celebrations. Invite others to help support. Be clear about what you can and what you cannot do. Practice: What boundaries do you need to set for yourself in order to accompany others?
One story from my grandmother’s practice of accompaniment keeps coming back to me. Back in the early 1960s, my grandmother’s friend, “Queenie,” received hard news: her mother was in the hospital after trying to take her life. One did not discuss such things in the 1960s. Yet Queenie went to my grandmother, who was a young mother herself, asking for counsel. This was a friendship built on years of daily mutual support. My grandmother did not flinch: “You’ve got to go to your mother. This is a time when she needs to know that you love her.” My grandmother then offered to take care of Queenie’s children while she was gone: “I’ll accompany you so you can accompany your mother.”
What a gift it is to have neighbors who we can accompany in this life. May we find our way together. Bountiful blessings on your journey with one another.
resource: van Dernoot Lipsky, Laura; Burk, Connie. Trauma Stewardship: An Everyday Guide to Caring for Self While Caring for Others.
