Compassion in action
When we’ve become who we need to be, it is time for us to turn toward helping others. In our world today, anyone with a television, radio, newspaper or social media will know that we are watching people flee for their lives in more than one place in the world. We’re watching countries shift their minds and monies toward helping.
“We are interconnected that when we improve ourselves, we help others, and when we improve others, we also help ourselves. This is part of the wisdom of synergy.” ~ Paul Wong
It’s not enough to only serve ourselves in the time we have in our world. Not only is the perception of existence itself in the balance but our relationship with humanity is being tested. Do we, as a species have the innate ability to help others? At the very least, have compassion for their plight?
We struggle with the technicalities of how we can help others in such vast quantities. War, flooding, fires, and other natural disasters (yes, war is man made, but it must be that our need to war is stronger than our need for peace, or humans would have figured it out that it never actually solves any problems by now). These are daunting, overwhelming experiences that we have all been affected by at some point in our lives.
Help one person
Is it too hard for us to help everyone? For most people, yes. But we can help one person.
We can work toward compassion for those less fortunate than us. That is within our grasp and a concept so light and free, we can practically taste it’s sweet essence of love for our fellow humans.
Compassion is an artform. It is not the same as feeling sorry for someone. It is not the same as helping someone. It’s not even the same as giving a charitable hand toward others.
www.merriam-webster.com/ dictionary/compassion
Full Definition of COMPASSION : sympathetic consciousness of others’ distress together with a desire to alleviate it
To see and feel
It is the ability to not only SEE the distress in others, but also FEEL the strong desire to alleviate that distress. In so doing, we must never lose sight of the fact that they are as human as we are. What we feel, so will they. What we are, so too, are those who may need our help.
With compassion comes a great responsibility to help without looking down, but instead, to help up. With compassion, comes the ability to see each person as you would be able to see yourself in their shoes. It is the cornerstone to empathy, one of the greatest gifts we’ve been given. And so under utilized in our fast paced world of “stuff” and “competition”.
Each culture views compassion differently. The universal truth is, when we look at the face of a stranger, we recognize the emotions there. Only we can make a conscious effort to tap into the basic human emotion of feeling compassion for someone else. And then, do something for them.
About the author: Karen E.M. Henry is a transitions life coach, writer and speaker. She specializes in working with people who want to create positive changes and savor who they want to be. Her full bio can be found at: wings13326.wix.com/wings13326#!about-karen-e-m-henry-ma/c11k