My first handcycle rides were slow.
We’re talking an embarrassing kind of slow, the kind of slow where the neighbor ladies pushing kid-carriers sometimes passed me. And that’s when I was moving at all and not stopped to rest my weak, skinny arms.
I was really, really slow.
My fastest ride during the summer of 1999 was probably around 7 mph, but I managed to crank that primitive bike 1000 miles in 10 weeks. Whenever I tell that story and someone does the math and wonders, “How did you manage it?” my response is simple.
Empathy and Compassion
By myself, relying on my own strength and resources, I likely would have quit. I would have skipped a day because I was discouraged. One day would have become two and then a week, and handcycling might have become one more in a line of failures.
But God sent folks into my life who wouldn’t let me quit. They showed up, not every day but somehow on the days that mattered, and kept me going.
Riding with me wasn’t fun. Riding a bike at 4-5 mph isn’t a workout, it’s a drag. And to be honest, I likely did a fair amount of complaining about how hard it was, how I wasn’t getting any stronger, how this was just a colossal waste of time and effort.
So why did they do it? Why keep coming back if it wasn’t doing anything for them?
Empathy: the willingness to see through another’s eyes. My friends perceived my struggle, not through their strength but through my weakness.
Compassion: co-suffering. My friends made my problem…their problem. They stepped into my struggle and made it their own.
Their empathy and compassion moved them to act and change my life. The 1500-mile Mississippi River Ride and the FREEDOM TOUR flow directly from their kindness and compassion.
The opposite of empathy is privilege: it’s not a problem because it’s not a problem for me.
My friends might have said, “You’re responsible for your own recovery. Either get to work, or fail. Your choice. It’s a free country. Not our problem.”
They might have washed their hands, shrugged their shoulders, and spent their time doing their own workouts. They had that privilege.
I’m grateful for my friends’ empathy and compassion. I’m grateful for friends who set aside their power. They shared some of their courage; that’s called encourage. It was much needed and appreciated.
It takes some humility to listen to the other guy’s story deeply enough to see it through his eyes. You have to let go of the “yeah, but’s” and the privilege of re-framing in your own terms, until you can truly see, as much as possible, what it’s like from his point of view.
That’s what Jesus did. He surrendered the privilege of glory, of “equality with God,” and became a servant so we could know He understood our perspective.
Do nothing out of selfish ambition or vain conceit. Rather, in humility value others above yourselves, not looking to your own interests but each of you to the interests of the others.
In your relationships with one another, have the same mindset as Christ Jesus:
Who, being in very nature God,
did not consider equality with God something to be used to his own advantage;
rather, he made himself nothing
by taking the very nature of a servant,
being made in human likeness.
And being found in appearance as a man,
he humbled himself
by becoming obedient to death—
even death on a cross! (Philippians 2:3-8)
I’m grateful for a community that doesn’t count privilege as something to grasp. The FREEDOM TOUR strives to be that sort of community, one in which we demonstrate empathy, compassion, and service. It’s an imperfect journey, for sure, but we have our share of fun along the way.
Sound like something you might like? Check out our website.
We preparing to crank up some fun stuff for next year. We’d love to have you join us.
