When we are compassionate

I was feeling sad because I have been hearing story after story this week from people who are being treated without compassion. People who are hurting at the moment but no one is seeing their pain. All they are concerned about is their gain but what they forget is ultimately when we lack compassion, we lack self-fulfillment which eventually leads to self-destruction.

Compassion is one of the greatest emotions we can ever experience because as Arthur Jersild says, “Compassion is the ultimate and most meaningful embodiment of emotional maturity. It is through compassion that a person achieves the highest peak and deepest reach in his or her search for self-fulfillment.”

Last night I tossed and turned when I got home. Feeling like I need to do something. And so I took to the Internet – God bless the power of the Internet ­- to research compassion. To understand more about what compassion means to us as human and spiritual beings and why it was evoking such strong emotion within me. And once I discovered its importance,  I felt the need to share the importance of compassion in our lives particularly at this time of the year when we are expected to be joyful and reverent. When we are supposed to observe peace and love. When we are meant to be spreading good cheer.

I go back to the blog I wrote on Monday asking that we be mindful of those who are suffering at the moment. To remember to hold them in our thoughts if we are not suffering. To remember to reach out to them with empathy and compassion. To remember that compassion is the basis of all morality.

As Arnold Toynbee says, “Compassion is the desire that moves the individual self to widen the scope of its self-concern to embrace the whole of the universal self.”

Compassion is that which joins us together as spiritual beings. No man or woman wants to feel unloved, unheard or like he or she does not belong and when we lack compassion that is how we make him or her feel.

So I am urging us all to remember it prophets not a man to fail to show others that they understand what they are experiencing. It prophets him only when he demonstrates he will move mountains to help them to return to their natural state. Recognising if he does not, not only will others self-destruct but so shall he. Because we are one. Emotions and feelings intertwined more than we will ever know or understand.

Please above all else, let’s remember to put ourselves in the shoes of those that suffer and extend a hand to help them because in doing so, we help ourselves. Remembering always that expressing compassion is the greatest gift we can ever give to others because in doing so, we receive its gift as well.

And so I will end with another quote to remind us of the importance of compassion. “A moment of self-compassion can change your entire day. A string of such moments can change the course of your life.” Christopher Germer, The Mindful Path to Self-Compassion

And just by writing this blog I feel  the sadness I felt lifting and being replaced with joy to know I am trying to move us in the direction of expressing compassion by teaching myself about its importance and sharing my lesson with you.