compassion

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At what point in the time line of our existence did compassion become a 'dirty word'? When did people start caring only for themselves? Is this the majority or the minority's view in today's society? What is happening in their daily lives that makes people feel and express the very real thought that no one else matters but them?

We are all guilty actually. I don't exempt myself. I have been there, done that, and thought of only me at times in the last 47 years of my life. I admit it. I try to put myself in the other person's shoes most of the time but sometimes it's an impossible task because of the circumstances or the person or the acts that were done to me. I am only human. I never pretended to be perfect.

My past short comings are out there for the world to condemn. Res ipsa loquitur. My saving grace is firmly planted in the knowledge though, that each day is a new day to start over and try to do things right. The past is the past.

So I always try... always try. I always try to think how would I feel if it was me. The times when I am successful my heart grieves for the other person's loss, hurts for their circumstances, hopes for their recovery, prays for their healing and wonders if there is anything I can do to help lighten their heart and right their world.

Compassion.

Why is today's prevalent thought process so set against caring for one another? Is it fear? Are people afraid there isn't enough to go around in this life? Scarcity mentality? There are only so many pieces of a pie? Can there be only one pie when it comes to the world? Are people starving so much emotionally that they feel they can't spare even a small piece of their compassion for others?

Is it the feeling that there isn't enough of any one thing to go around that people feel they have to ration their feelings, their love, their care, their concern, their "everything" just to protect what they do have or who they are?

Is it being self-centered? Other's aren't their responsibility? The only people to care about is themselves, their immediate family, their close friends? No one else matters? The world's not their problem?

The world is a global existence.
Is the world a global problem?
Do you believe that you are an island?
Why are people scared to care for each other?
Can you really care for another when you are worried only about yourself?
Do you even want to?

What is compassion?

Would you say you really do care about others yet label and group those less fortunate than you? Or more fortunate for that matter? Discrimination is an equal opportunity judge. It goes both ways. Do you judge a person by their circumstances without knowing their story of how they came to be where they are today? Do you enjoy being judged by others? Do you even care what anyone else thinks? Feels? Experiences?

Is compassion a feeling or an action?

Do you think it's necessary in life to feel compassionate for those you know nothing about other than they have lived different from you? Believed different from you? Ended up different from where you think they should be? Live, work, love, do, are ~ all different from you? What about those who are the same? Do you care for them simply because you share some similar base thought processes and beliefs?

Who are we to decide what is best for another? Who are we to choose another's road? Who are we to judge another's life?

Just who do we think we are???
I have no clue... honestly. None.

All I know is that it makes me sad to see compassion called out as "wrong" as oppossed to a 'right' choice, "bad" as opposed to 'good', and a host of other negative labels. Why? None of us alone can carry the world on our shoulders but why do we need to tear it down on top of everything else? Why do people tear each other apart like two lions fighting for one piece of meat? Is the food supply truly that limited for all of us? Do people really believe the sky is falling? The world is ending? This is it?

I hope not. I hope not for my children's sake and my children's children and for the world's future. I hope that compassion isn't dying and that kindness isn't dead. For all who are to live after me, I pray people will begin to see everyone as a whole united body and stop dissecting us into parts and cutting us apart. Where is the edification in bringing other people down? What is the purpose? Do you enjoy belittling others? Do you like it when you are belittled? What is the point?

There isn't one.

We are a body. All of us. This human existence on earth. We are a global system. Even if you want to separate people into groups and judge them according to whatever your core values are ~ it doesn't change the fact that we're all in this together. It's bigger than simply a country, a state, a city, a neighborhood, your own home.

A body needs it's heart to live. To pump our life's blood into the system to keep it going. We need our lungs to breathe. We need our legs to carry us and our arms to feed. We need each other, even if you don't believe. When the world view becomes the mentality "It's them against us" ~ we are simply walking dead people. Without realizing it, you have cut up your own body and allowed it bleed to death. There's nothing left to be.

Without compassion, there is no reason to live.
You're dead already. Inside at the core.
The place where each of us truly lives and breathes.

I pray for peace...

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"A human being is a part of the whole called by us universe, a part limited in time and space. He experiences himself, his thoughts and feeling as something separated from the rest, a kind of optical delusion of his consciousness. This delusion is a kind of prison for us, restricting us to our personal desires and to affection for a few persons nearest to us. Our task must be to free ourselves from this prison by widening our circle of compassion to embrace all living creatures and the whole of nature in its beauty."
~ Albert Einstein

"The major block to compassion is the judgment in our minds. Judgment is the mind's primary tool of separation."
~ Diane Berke

"We who lived in concentration camps can remember the men who walked through the huts comforting others, giving away their last piece of bread. They may have been few in number, but they offer sufficient proof that everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms -- to choose one's attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one's own way."
~ Viktor Frankl

"The value of compassion cannot be over-emphasized. Anyone can criticize. It takes a true believer to be compassionate. No greater burden can be borne by an individual than to know no one cares or understands."
~ Arthur H. Stainback

"Compassion is not weakness, and concern for the unfortunate is not socialism."
~ Hubert H. Humphrey

"I came upon a doctor who appeared in quite poor health. I said, 'There's nothing that I can do for you that you can't do for yourself.' He said, 'Oh yes you can. Just hold my hand. I think that that would help.' So I sat with him a while then I asked him how he felt. He said, 'I think I'm cured."
~ Conor Oberst

"The indigenous peoples thought of legal, illegal, and other landownership issues as "fleas arguing over who owns the dog". There is no way to separate our realities and needs from others, no man is an island."
~ Crocodile Dundee

~~~ My Quotes Page ~~~