We live in a challenging world with a lot coming at us from many directions. How do we keep our compassion, our hope and our joy alive? Or do we? We point out all the obvious ways to cope: using humour, taking a walk, reading a book, limiting the amount of bad news we watch and seeking out good news, or doing something nice for someone else. But we also acknowledge the importance of sitting with our distress and listening to the distress of others with open ears and heart. It is not so much about keeping it together as it is about working through and finding a response to challenging times that is uniquely ours and that helps us to take the right action. The conversation is one that makes us work at articulating our beliefs about human nature and how finding and hanging onto the best of our human qualities is important to counteracting the wors ...