Compassionate Integrity Training CIT-Faciltator-Guide-2.1-Final | Page 102

C OMPASSIONATE I NTEGRITY T RAINING
A S ECULAR E THICS A PPROACH TO C ULTIVATING P ERSONAL , S OCIAL AND E NVIRONMENTAL F LOURISHING
N AIKAN A CTIVITY : C OUNTING H OURS *
Goal: To help participants recognize how much care and time has been invested in their upbringing.
Materials: Calculator, paper (if you don’t have CIT Manuals), writing instrument
Time: 15 to 20 Minutes
Instructions:
1. Explain what Naikan is, if you have not already (see above activity for a brief description.)
2. Ask the participants, “Turn to the Naikan chart in your CIT Manual. This is a supplementary
activity sometimes used in Naikan. Complete the chart by choosing a primary caregiver you
had while growing up (this can be your mother, father, aunt, grandparent, nanny, whoever you
feel like took care of you growing up). Calculate the number of hours your primary caregiver
spent doing these basic things for you from the time you were born (or even while you were in
the womb, if you like) until they stopped doing these things for you. You may use a calculator
if you like.”
3. If they do not have the CIT Manual, you can project or draw the chart below for them to use.
4. After they have completed the calculations, debrief by asking the following questions:
a.
“Were you surprised by the total number of hours, days and years that were dedicated
to your care and well-being?”
b. “As we know there are 24 hours in a day and 365 days in a year. So there are 8,760
hours in a year. If you divide your number by 8,760, you can translate it into years of
someone’s life. What does it suggest to us that someone spent that much time and
energy doing these basic things for us?”
c.
“Would we generally expect another person to spend that much time taking care of us?
Why or why not? Does it make a difference if we have put a label on another person,
such as ‘mother’ or ‘father’ in terms of what our expectations of them are?”
5. You may conclude the activity by saying, “Sometimes the labels we place on people, such as
‘mother,’ or ‘father,’ or any label for that matter, can obscure the fact that they are simply
C ENTER FOR C OMPASSION , I NTEGRITY AND S ECULAR E THICS | L IFE U NIVERSITY | M ARIETTA , G EORGIA
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