Transcript Disclaimer – Please note that the following transcript has been machine generated by an AI software and therefore may include errors or omissions.

Robin Daly
Hello and welcome to the Yes To Life show on UK Health Radio. My name is Robin Daly, host for the show and founder of Yes To Life, the UK’s integrative cancer care charity that’s currently celebrating 20 years of working to bring breath into cancer care, to bring respect and attention to much more than just the physical aspects of encountering a diagnosis of cancer and of going through cancer treatment. My guest on the show today is someone who gives much of her attention to the topic of compassion and to the way this affects our experience and our relationships. Compassion is a key element of integrative care, so I’m delighted to explore this territory with Dr Liz Sparks. This is a big welcome to the Yes To Life show.

Dr Liz Sparkes
Thank you very much for having me.

Robin Daly
I’m delighted to meet you a lot and to take this opportunity to thank you for being hugely proactive supporter of YesLife and all the work we do, so thank you very much. So this is your first time on the show and so I wondered if you’d introduce yourself to our listeners by telling them a little bit about who you are, where you are, what you do and why you do it.

Dr Liz Sparkes
I live the outskirts of the Cotswolds, and my background is in health psychology. And I specialised in pain. I’m a doctor of pain, which I’m not sure how appealing that is. But over the years of working in health psychology and then lecturing and teaching health psychology, I became more and more interested in the impact of long-term conditions and pain and really how we can bring some soothing and improve the way that the body feels when we’re experiencing so much difficulty in a physical way. And I went through my own challenges and I started to become really interested in meditation and actually more focused then upon compassion practices. And after some time and dedicating my own practice to compassion practices, I then developed an MSc in mindfulness and compassion with some other really wonderful teachers and taught that for a while.

Dr Liz Sparkes
And then things started to really expand for me. And I then started to lead groups and workshops, retreats, one-to-one sessions. And it was really lovely. It just started to bring in lots of other things, energy work, coaching, and just really expanded.

Robin Daly
All right, quite a quite development. It’s interesting you started off with this training in pain management and it’s an interesting and hugely important topic. We’ve actually focused on it quite a bit on the show here, also on podcasts. But it’s so interesting, it’s like so many things to do with health. It has this spectrum between the physical and the mental, emotional, spiritual side. And you can usually influence these things from either end, it seems. And so, whereas of course, healthcare tradition is tended to be very sort of one dimensional about this, and just take a very practical approach to it, but missing a huge trick. But pain, we’re going to move on today and we want to speak about an aspect of healthcare that I feel sure it’s going to include maybe talking about pain, but that’s compassion and the part that plays in managing the many and often intense difficulties getting through cancer and cancer treatment.

Robin Daly
So this is what you asked me to focus on today. I’m very pleased to devote the time to it because it’s completely in line with our drive to reform cancer care with our charter for oncology. That’s all to do with the patient and clinician relationship. So anyway, just to get us started, why does it even matter? Isn’t it enough for healthcare just to be efficient and effective?

Dr Liz Sparkes
No. I think what, I think the best way for me to just start to broach this subject really is to talk about my friend. He died last year, last September, so it’s been over a year. He had stomach cancer and during that last year I supported him pretty much every week with an hour, hour and a half session of really just being there for him with whatever was happening. And one of the things we talked about so often was the brutal, and these were his words, the brutal experience he was having when he would go to see the healthcare providers. Yes, there was the ultimate care and he couldn’t fault the way things were brought together and the structure and the way his care was brought to him, absolutely, but often the way that the information was delivered, the timelines,

Dr Liz Sparkes
the prospects left him bruised and quite wounded and I think with some very gentle and actually quite simple changes to the way that often his prospects or the outcomes of his treatment were discussed could have had a huge impact on his well-being in those last months of his life.

Robin Daly
Interesting to use that word brutal, because I would agree, I think it’s brutal too. And yes, as you said, it is efficient and effective in most cases. You know, they do deliver in a certain kind of way which is suitable for circumstances where somebody is unconscious or whatever. You know, it works when you’ve got an emergency and you’re going to save somebody’s life. Well, that’s it. That’s how you do it. And the more efficient and effective you are, the better. But dealing with somebody over something which is, you know, a life threatening illness or something where they’re having, they’re facing an existential threat. Well, it just doesn’t work. It’s just completely inadequate. Yeah, well, thank you for that. So when you start to look a little closely at the practitioner-patient relationship, you begin to see what a multifaceted situation is with lots of sufferers involved.

Robin Daly
Yes. And furthermore, the healing is about a lot more than just doling out the right medicine. Would you say a bit about compassion as medicine and the effect it can have both on the practitioner and the recipient?

Dr Liz Sparkes
Yeah, absolutely. And it’s such a subtle, but beautiful thread is how I would start talking about that. And really, compassion is not a wholly cognitive experience. The development of compassion is very much an embodied state. And we can feel when someone holds a strong compassionate presence. I think you can, you can hear it in their words, you can see it in their body language, you can feel it in their presence. And that alone creates a very, very different experience. And there’s two sides to this, as you say, there’s very much the compassion that the practitioner is holding towards not only their experience of dealing with that patient, but also the compassion towards their patient. But then we’ve also got the individual experiencing this so very difficult course of treatment and the compassion that they need to hold for the practitioner, and then the compassion that they need to hold for themselves.

Dr Liz Sparkes
And so it really is two way. And I think, with very simple amounts of education, both, both parties can actually start to embody that compassion, because what starts to happen is just by bringing a feeling of gentleness and kindness into our awareness, to very even very much a physical experience of gentleness and kindness, it starts to create changes, you know, hormonally and physiologically, it starts to calm the way that we’re thinking and experiencing. And it brings us into a state of open heartedness, really. So we’re more likely to choose our words more carefully, we’re more likely to experience less sort of injury in a relational experience. And we’re more likely to allow the body to stay in a state of calm and not go into threat or, you know, overdrive and protection. So really, it’s about helping people cultivate this embodied state that is soothing and nurturing and really offers a lot to both parties.

Robin Daly
Well, that is an excellent point, and one I think of often is that, you know, of course, two health services are busy being efficient and effective and is maxed out. The idea of sort of being compassionate is just like another ask on top of everything else, you know, as if it’s just going to deplete them further still in their already totally depleted state. And of course, they’re completely used to working in a system where they don’t have to do that. And so it does seem like an extra burden to impose on them, but it’s actually been shown in trials and things that this is exactly wrong, you know, that actually to begin to work with compassion makes the work far more rewarding, far better for the practitioners. And the epidemic of practitioner burnout that we’re facing at the moment is a way of addressing it and it actually helps them. So I think we have to strongly underline this is not an extra ask, it’s actually something to improve a lot of both patients and practitioners.

Dr Liz Sparkes
Yeah, massively, because it actually is supporting the practitioner one to feel safe in their own experience, which is extremely challenging, you know, there’s a huge responsibility and feeling of, you know, responsibility towards their patient and delivering very difficult messages. And actually, by bringing in this element of compassion, it actually bolsters against a lot of that stress. It actually, I mean, myself, you know, I’m seeing clients all the time, and I’ve found that as that embodied compassionate state has slowly enhanced, I’m so much less likely to hang on to the difficulties of others. I’m so much less likely to give myself a hard time if I don’t feel I’ve completely nailed it in a session. I’m a lot less tired. So absolutely, it’s actually going to do nothing but enhance that, that practitioner’s experience and also wellness, and really sort of change the way they quite possibly feel about certain things as well.

Robin Daly
OK, now I just want to talk a little bit more about something I mentioned earlier. So humans were complicated and just like pain, for instance, has got this physical and then the psychological, emotional, spiritual aspects as well. Actually, that’s true of most issues we have. And there’s often merits mentioned to approaching things directly straight on, you know, take some supplements to support gut healing, whatever it is. And then what you might call the left field approach, get some Reiki to a sandbar, whatever it is, music therapy. So I get the sense this is the area you’re working in very much the left field. You know, could you want to talk a little bit about the left field?

Dr Liz Sparkes
And I don’t think it’s the path to necessarily be, you know, the all and everything. I think everybody is so individual and I know from my own experiences of, you know, very severe endometriosis. I needed that medical support in a big way. But actually what helped me heal and really engage with that medical support was all of the other more left field approaches and together it was the answer for me anyway. And I think everybody’s going to feel very differently about it. And I think what these other approaches offer are, again, it’s tapping into that soothing system. You know, when we’re through a period of poor health or illness or recovery even, there is, you know, a huge impact on the mind, which is then impacting on the ability of the body to, you know, come to a state of ease or wellness or just being able to cope with the medications or the treatment.

Dr Liz Sparkes
And a lot of these methods are tapping into that soothing system. So for example, you know, we have various research now that shows that Reiki does calm, you know, the mind, the body, it does enhance that soothing system. I mean, it’s working on many energetic levels, but in its most basic quality, it is having an impact and quite a sort of building upon each session impact for people. And sound again, different sounds will allow people to start to disengage with perhaps difficult states of mind or patterns because it’s actually bringing us again into that slightly sort of in-between state of ease, where it’s more easy to tap into that feeling of soothing and calming. So I think that’s really one of the first things about a lot of these more left-heeled approaches. But I think also they all have such individual and amazing benefits. And I think it’s about finding out which is the right one, depending on what you’re going through, what you’re experiencing and what needs that support.

Dr Liz Sparkes
But I think the harmony between, you know, that very medical approach and that more left-heeled approaches just can be quite amazing.

Robin Daly
Well, it’s kind of the basis in a way of integrative medicine as you bring this whole spectrum of approaches together and you get a much better result because you’re addressing the person in a much broader, more holistic way and so it does make complete sense. All right, so I mentioned a charter for oncology and I know you’re aware of it and you’re a why you think it’s vital we re-evaluate and fundamentally reform the doctor-patient relationship in oncology in the ways that the charter proposes.

Dr Liz Sparkes
Again, just going back to those initial points for both for both parties for the practitioner and for for the patient really And again, I’m going to use one example of of my friend, you know, because really he was the expert in all this. He was, you know, experiencing all of this and we talked about one particular example that when he You know He did actually choose as regularly as possible not to know Timelines and things like that because there’s a he was a psychologist as well and as a psychologist, you know He really understood how that could impact, you know The mind and body connection so he chose more often than not not to know but I think as as it got to the point where There was a sort of more need to know I think what we discussed was,

Dr Liz Sparkes
you know, just how different that message could have come across for him in terms of so we’re we’re, you know, we’re approaching a point now where You know There is there is essentially the end of life care and And I think what he would have really liked is somebody to be there to say to him and you know What would be valuable to you during this period of time? What would you like us to help you arrange during this point? What do you feel is needed a you know, sort of deeply introspective and and soul level And I think that’s what was so lacking for him was that side of things and it just felt so it just felt scary it felt scary and it was the fear and From from my perspective as a health psychologist as well We know that the way that messages are Are delivered or the way that we understand treatments or it’s going to have an impact on how the body responds And we do here don’t we that when people are given sometimes timelines In a certain way.

Dr Liz Sparkes
I’m not saying it’s not always important but it it can Bring a lot of fear and the body does just shut down a lot quicker. So those are my first initial thoughts.

Robin Daly
okay well you know as you realize we’re quite strongly behind a deep revolution in the culture of the way that the patient-doctor relationship is carried out and yeah there’s just so much potential there for change i think you know and that’s what the nub of what’s going on really if that was able to uh grow if you like it’s it’s a very constricted narrow tight and giving relationship as it stands it was able to ease off expand and become much more human the potential for the work that could be done there to help people is you know enormous i think i mean you just have to look at the simple thing the absolute the simplest things whereby um we know beyond a shadow doubt that exercise is good for almost anybody who’s got cancer in some form or another whatever suits them you know some sort of exercise is good and the the system is so tight that it doesn’t really allow for our oncologists to be telling their patients giving them that piece of hopeful information to empower them and and using the power of their position as a qualified doctor who’s supposed to be helping their condition in delivering that message if they say it to them rather than somebody else it’s going to carry the most weight the patient will go away with something which they believe in that empowers them to help themselves i mean incredible it’s so simple and yet it’s not happening really very little does that happen in the uk um it’s shocking really and that that’s that’s kind of a measure of just how constricted it is so

Dr Liz Sparkes
And it must be incredibly difficult for the consultants and practitioners because, you know, they are limited and they have this huge weight upon them of responsibility and time and, you know, it’s by no means their fault, it’s because, like you say, the way that the system is operating.

Robin Daly
Yeah, it’s a cultural thing. And you’re right, it’s a terrible burden to, I mean, you know, Sachi, his famous quote about continuously repeating a failed experiment, as well as some treatments are, and they know it’s not going to work, and they just carry on doing it. What a soulless job to do. Must be crushing, absolutely crushing, yeah.

Dr Liz Sparkes
And, you know, they, as much as the patients need that care, you know, for going through that as well and the weight that that has upon them.

Robin Daly
Absolutely. All right. So I think with things like compassion, there’s a tendency to see them more as characteristics, like he or she is a compassionate person, but I believe you’d say that there are ways to practice compassion. Am I right?

Dr Liz Sparkes
Yeah, and I think in the most simple form, if we were to give an example of, you know, the way that we operate with our thoughts, to be more compassionate, we can think about how, say, something goes, something goes wrong, you know, I don’t know, I forget to attend an appointment. And I forget to attend an appointment. And what happens is, what we could do is just stay with that initial experience. Okay, so that initial experience is, you know, I might feel a little bit of frustration with myself, I might feel a bit embarrassed. And perhaps I noticed that in the body, you know, the heart races, and I just feel uncomfortable around the stomach area. And I could just breathe with that very physical experience. However, we’re generally not that compassionate to ourselves, what we tend to do is something goes wrong, or we make a mistake, or something happens that’s unpleasant or difficult.

Dr Liz Sparkes
And we don’t stay with that initial and true experience, what we tend to do is then bring in, I’m always doing this wrong, or I’ll never get that right, or this is going to now lead to that. And before we know it, we’ve created sort of a whole catalog of events, and a lot of physical discomfort and psychological discomfort, which isn’t true. So at its most simple, the compassionate approach within ourselves is to be with things with gentleness and curiosity, as they are so that we’re able to not only learn from them, but actually not hang on and create more pain for ourselves.

Robin Daly
Right, so if you were lined up with a row of oncologists and you’re told, right, okay, Liz, your job is going to be to give these guys some training in compassionate delivery. How would you start?

Dr Liz Sparkes
So I think the first thing would be to actually really support them in their own experience because it starts with us. And if we’re particularly struggling, it’s very, very difficult to offer that to anyone else. So the first place would be to actually bring that experience and feeling of compassion into everybody’s physical experience to start to work with some of the difficulties that were there for them to begin with, to work with the critical voice, to work with the feelings that are coming up every day, dealing with the pressures that they have. So it would always be about the individual first. And then from that, it is so easy to then generate and develop a compassionate approach towards others because once that embodied state and that kindness and gentleness and curiosity is developed within the self, it becomes so very natural towards others. It’s almost just spontaneous. Does that make sense?

Robin Daly
complete sense actually, yeah. And, you know, what are the chances? Do you think this might happen? Well, I certainly hope so. I mean, the good thing about it is that most things within a system like the NHS, most things are kind of top-down instructions to get people to conform, you know, and what you’re talking about is something very different, essentially. And so it could be very refreshing and it could be very revolutionary as well, just because it doesn’t match up to the rest of the system. I mean, you know, the systems, the problem, of course, top-down command control system is great for delivering emergency care, which is what it was built for. You know, it works for that, but it just doesn’t work for caring. Where does care fit in a command and control? It doesn’t, you know, it’s like being touchy, feeling in the army or something, you know, it doesn’t work. You have to do what you’re told. And so, yeah, I mean, your suggestion is spot on, I think. But it’s quite a turnaround, so.

Dr Liz Sparkes
Yeah, I’ve had the pleasure and the sort of honor of going into the firearms department with the police to start this. And it, you know, initially, obviously, there was some raised eyebrows. But actually, you know, they really took it on in the in that initial meeting and really, really engaged and understood, you know, that actually it comes with helping themselves and creating that that state within first. So yeah, I don’t think it’s impossible.

Robin Daly
No, well, if you’re able to do that in that situation, then it’s not. And yeah, of course, you know, there’s been lots in the news over the last decade about the culture of the police. It’s a cultural issue they’ve been trying to address. So presumably you are there as part of efforts to address that. And so if they can do it, so can the medics. Yeah, that’s very encouraging to hear. Okay, I wanted to ask, I think it’s true to say you work with both individuals and groups. Yeah. And it seems there’s definitely a place and time for both. But I want to talk a little about the potential of groups, because I believe that as a society, we’re only just beginning to appreciate the power of the group to bring deep levels of healing to kind of foundational aspects of our relationship to life.

Robin Daly
That at the same time, this may be helping with what’s ever specific issues, is there are things about a group, for example, whether, you know, you could be addressing your sense of belonging or your experience of meaningful, vulnerable, intimate relationship or about shared humanity. So these are really ground level things about the way we relate to the whole of life. And so it seems to me they got extraordinary power and they can do things that it’s difficult to do, no one to one actually.

Dr Liz Sparkes
Absolutely, I think the power of the right group as well, yeah, can be absolutely amazing. And often it’s not having especially large groups, I think, if you want to cultivate a sort of sense of opening to vulnerability in a strong community. I think there’s almost that magic number of eight to 10 a lot of the time from personal experience. And I think, you know, you’ve said yourself that sense of community and sharing in vulnerability when it’s well held in a compassionate way can bring healing that, you know, isn’t really necessarily possible on an individual level, because there’s something that starts to happen when everybody is sharing from the perspective of the heart and also developing an understanding that they’re not alone. And I think there’s so much strength in that. We know that when we meet like-minded people who are singing from, you know, the same hymn sheet or they have a similar approach to life or they’re feeling things in the same way, we feel such a sense of relief and joy and passion.

Dr Liz Sparkes
And I think it’s the same when we’re in a position of vulnerability. If we’re in a group of people who really get that, and there’s always that mixture between those that are at a certain point and perhaps those who are just, you know, beginning or halfway through a particular process, there’s some real strength in that as well in sort of how it weaves together all these different parts of understanding and support, insights. And then I think there’s a feeling that starts to grow of almost like care. And I think if it’s held well, yeah, it can really take people through some amazing processes. And there’s almost an empowerment in group work that you can’t always get in one-to-one because people start to receive almost like the energy of the group and become empowered and more likely to create change within due to that group environment, if that makes sense.

Robin Daly
Very much so, yeah. I think they’re amazing and you know I was thinking about things like you know when you get into a group where you know you’re sharing for some, usually for some particular reason, it can be a cancer support group, whatever it is, and some of the basics are, well I feel like that everybody else is fine, that’s how we live, we think everybody else is okay but we’re a mess, you know, these sort of fundamental ways in which we differentiate ourselves from everybody else and therefore live in a way where we feel separate and therefore we act separate as well which makes the space slightly weirdly and you, once you put it in a group these things actually start to break down, don’t they, because it’s like you can’t get over the fact that actually other people, they’re saying just the same stuff as you and you know you begin to realize actually we’re all pretending,

Robin Daly
you know, and you know it’s a big hoax, the whole thing, so it’s like the emperor’s new clothes, it’s a sort of conspiracy of silence which is broken by speaking up in the group and it’s such a powerful thing and yeah so yeah I’m getting more and more enthusiastic about running groups and having more groups and yeah I think they’re brilliant things. All right so we’ve got a little bit of time left and I wanted, I thought we’d go back to the left field now, so you do all sorts of things which for a lot of people are like quite far out, okay, sandbar feeling and shamanic rituals and things, I wonder would you tell us about them, why you do them, what they bring to people, you know, the differences you know in sandbar feeling and shamanic rituals, you know, I’d just like to have a little explore around here.

Dr Liz Sparkes
Okay yeah sure so I feel like the best way to approach this would be to actually give an example of one of the group sessions that I run seasonally and what happens is it’s very much a shamanic inspired session where everybody joins and takes note of where we are very much in the and what’s been happening in their lives it’s almost like a it’s in a group so it’s it’s held in that that way but it’s also like a stopping point it’s actually like let’s just stop and look where we’ve been where we’re going because a lot of the time people don’t create that in their lives.

Robin Daly
Not making any assumptions here and just say, okay, when you say in a shamanic kind of way, what do you mean? What’s shamanic?

Dr Liz Sparkes
Yeah, so again, it’s honoring that connection. It’s honoring that connection to all and everything. It’s honoring that connection to the seasons. And so it’s a very ceremonial approach. So we go through a process of ceremony to really honor everything and to allow everybody to notice not only how far they’ve come, but actually where they’re going and what they need. What do they need to bring forward from within? What do they need externally? We always have a ceremony and sometimes that will, it will always involve fire because I love fire and drums. Always got to have a fire and a drum. It’s just such a lovely feeling in the heart. I think when the fire is there and, some people will write down loads and loads of things in terms of what’s been happening over the last two or three months and they just want to get that really heartfelt feeling of when they put that piece of paper into the fire.

Dr Liz Sparkes
It’s like, yes. And everybody is witnessing that. And that’s a powerful thing. You know, why do we have christenings and funerals and baptism because we are honoring and witnessing a sacred act really. And that’s no different when we’re running these sessions is it’s subtle things that I have found in honoring someone else’s letting go or what they’re calling in or what they’re speaking about that they’ve experienced in a very beautifully sort of ritualistic way with the fire and the drum. And it’s bringing us into, you know, that very centered heart-based place because of the fire, the drum, the connection to nature, the ability to be witnessed in a very pure way. And then we will always, you know, use sound to maybe go into a meditation or a visualization. And again, what I really believe in through all these different trainings is that my aim and what I hold, you know, very, very strong in my awareness is that I want to help people empower themselves.

Dr Liz Sparkes
So we’ll use the sound, we’ll use the visualization or the compassionate meditation to help people go from this very cognitive place that we’re all living into a very heart-based place to actually access their own knowing. So if you think you’ve gone through that process or talking about it being witnessed in the ceremony and then you go to the sound which relaxes and calms and creates a much more of an easier way to go inward, people are in a perfect place then to call upon their own intuitions and their own knowing. And I think through this process, we can create so much very gentle healing and change for people. I have people coming back, you know, to each one because it’s almost like it creates this stopping point and this sort of readjusting and then they go away with what, you know, they’re going to do next to what they need to bring in.

Dr Liz Sparkes
And really, all I’m doing is just holding the right environment for that to take place. And I would say that’s the essence of, even though I’ve done all these different trainings, that’s what I’m most interested in doing is helping people uncover their own knowing and their own insights and offering an opportunity to process difficulty or sort of honor what they’ve got through, yeah.

Robin Daly
Well, that’s very interesting. I mean, you know, so much is documented now about the importance for the unbelievably difficult task that it is of navigating through cancer and cancer care. The importance of being in touch with your own intuition, your own inner wisdom of feeling centered in that way and being able to direct yourself and find out where to go out of myriad of ways you could go. And so the fact you’re offering something which is directly to help people, that is very important because of course, for some people, this is like, they don’t know anything about it. They just never lived in that way before, you know, they’ve just been blown around like a leaf in the wind trying to keep everybody happy and, you know, being busy.

Robin Daly
And suddenly they’re stopped in their tracks by cancer and they’ve got somebody telling them, which way do you want to go this or that? And they’ve got no idea and no sense of how to find out. So this, yeah, to have a way of actually bringing yourself back to yourself there, this sort of pause in life that you’re giving them, in order that they might get to know actually what they already know, they might get in touch with it, is a great thing to be able to offer them. So Sounds brilliant. Right on the left field, I’d say. Okay, well, look, we’re just about out of time. Do you want to let listeners know how they can find out more about you and what you do?

Dr Liz Sparkes
Yeah, thank you. And thank you for inviting me today. So I do have a website, which details the way that I work and the retreats that I offer and the days and that it’s DrLizSparkes.com and people can find me there.

Robin Daly
Okay well thanks for a very enlightening discussion. I’m confident lots of our listeners are going to find that really fascinating and so and thank you again for your sterling support of all our work at Yes To Life.

Dr Liz Sparkes
Thank you.

Robin Daly
Bye! I thoroughly enjoyed that exploration of compassion, what it is, how it affects us, and very particularly, how its presence or absence profoundly affects the nature of the patient-finishing relationship. If this is something you’ve got experience of, or you feel strongly about, then I encourage you to take a look at the Yes To Life Charter for Oncology. If you go to the charity’s website, that’s YesToLife.org.uk, and you scroll down the homepage a little, you’ll see a section on the charter and links to it. If you like what you read, there’s a further link to a petition to get the charter taken seriously. Sign up for it, leave a comment saying why you’re signing, and very importantly, encourage your family and friends to support you by doing the same. Many thanks for listening today. I hope you enjoyed that discussion as much as I did, and that you’ll be able to tune in again next week for another Yes To Life show here on UK Health Radio. Goodbye!