Compassion, while not exclusive to human beings, is possibly the greatest and most ennobling gift we have. It blesses both the giver and the receiver. It acknowledges and honours the oneness of all being.
I see Compassion as a kind of respect for the facts of Life, and a sensitive connection with the differing realities affecting each of us. Compassion unifies us in a celebration of the riddles of being alive. Compassion is the antidote to insularity.
In a being of Compassion, we are able to receive another's reality unjudgmentally alongside our own. It is the art of knowing in experience what it means to be human. Where that knowing is not immediately available, Compassion produces a willingness to do whatever it takes to explore another's experience for oneself so that it can be known. Compassion offers emotional shelter to the storm-tossed, while knocking gently on the doorway of another's experience with the invitation "Can I come and play with you?"
Compassion is no kin to understanding. In understanding, the mind simply grabs an experience, sticks a standard label on it and files it away into a pre-existing pigeon-hole. There is no freshness or aliveness of the heart in understanding. I have encountered people who understand everything and have found them to be emotionally among the poorest on the planet. In fact, a lack of compassion is a symptom of serious psychic damage.
Compassion arises initially from a willingness and commitment to explore the parts of oneself that we see in others, and to receive that self-knowledge with indulgent warmth, humour and lightness. A life committed to compassion begins with embracing the whole of oneself with a deep and tolerant "Yes".
We cannot give away what we don't have. Without compassion for self, what is given away looks and feels more like sympathy than empathy, more like pardoning than forgiveness, and more like pity and patronising than something that is felt with (not for) the other. Try this, and be aware of the feeling that surrounds these two sentences --
- I feel for you.
- I feel with you.
Say each alternately a few times. Feel into the difference between the two. One feels more detached than the other; the other feels more inclusive; doesn't it?
Whether the trigger arises in oneself or from another, Compassion is a voluntary expansion of the heart to embrace yet another raw experience of being alive. Compassion knows that life is too short for each of us to formulate every available experience, so it willingly interacts with others to openly share feelings and thoughts.
If you experience your life as lacking in compassion from others, start by seeking it within yourself, for yourself. Let it grow there. It will expand and, in time, naturally overflow into the world around you. Don't push it; let it happen in its own good time. When you find yourself spontaneously giving compassion away to others, do so without any consideration or expectations of what you might get back in return. Give it away as anonymously as you can. Give it away as a simple expression of Who You Choose to Be. Give it away for its own sake.
Compassion is the deepest expression of Connection. In Compassion there is no separation. In a state of Compassion, the old adage "There but for the grace of God, go I" becomes ---
"There, thanks to the Grace of God, am I."
Compassion frees us to be more than we think we are.
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