May all beings have happiness and the causes of happiness.
Weekday mornings in San Francisco’s Financial District I almost always cross paths with people who live on the streets. Some lie passed out on beds of scavenged cardboard, others wriggle out of dirty sleeping bags and recede into the shadows as the sidewalks grow crowded with those lining up for $5 coffees en route to work. The juxtaposition of realities is jarring, yet frighteningly easy to get used to—life in the city, as they say.
I am training myself not to look past the suffering. There is nothing normal about this, I remind myself. The soiled, tattered clothes, too often the stench of festering wounds, the complete lack of vitality in people’s eyes, if you dare take it all in, is shocking.
I struggle, not knowing what to do about it. My contributions to non-profits are pitiful when measured against the weight of the problem. I don’t have any great solutions to offer. But if given a chance, I do the most human thing I can think of: I acknowledge the presence of the people I encounter. Sometimes I offer money or food, usually just a smile and a greeting. I silently wish them happiness and the causes of happiness, as suggested by the Brahmaviharas, or The Four Immeasurables, of the Buddhist tradition.
Increasingly, though, the people I come across aren’t available for any interaction. Some are obviously on drugs or afflicted by mental illness (or both) and others, I imagine, have retreated to some inner place where the pain of such a life is dulled. Whatever the reason, more and more people on the street seem inaccessible, unwilling or unable to take part in any human exchange and likely unable to be present in any way for their own experience. This feels markedly different from past years, when you couldn’t walk past a person camped on the corner without them trying to strike up a conversation before asking for spare change.
I wonder what’s changed. Fewer handouts? More long-term homelessness related to addiction and mental illness? Is it possible that life on the street is harder today than a few years ago? I sense that many of the people I see are literally without hope. It’s painfully understandable. Their experience is the stuff of nightmares—living without the most basic human necessities and passing their days cold, hungry, largely disregarded or forgotten. They are deprived not only of the food and shelter needed for sustenance and wellbeing, but also of the kind of nourishment that sustains the spirit.
I do my best to acknowledge the existence of each homeless person I see. On the simplest human level, looking someone in the eye, offering a smile and good wishes, feels essential. At the core of any functional society is a willingness to engage, to witness each other’s vulnerability and suffering, and to help each other as we can. Sometimes the best we can do is offer our good wishes: May you have happiness and the causes of happiness.
I find it takes effort just to witness suffering. It is so much easier to look away, not to notice or feel this kind of misery. But I think noticing suffering is more than worthwhile, I think it is necessary—without it, we risk becoming less grateful and generous, more greedy and uncaring. We risk apathy and a hardening heart.
It’s easy to see how a lack of concern for others echoes and ultimately bolsters the sense of disparity and polarity dominating our politics and economies. That’s another big problem I don’t feel adequate to solve, but that I surely want to mitigate in the ways available to me.
So I continue the simplest practice of noticing those on the streets who are suffering. I aim to make a momentary connection and to be helpful if asked. Silently, I offer my best wishes for happiness and the causes of happiness. It’s not much, but it seems essential, one of the most important things I can do each day.