No Act of Compassion is Ever Wasted
Happy Monday! Are you ready for my new word of the week?
This week I chose to focus on “compassion.” Why did I choose this word? Well, first I thought I completely understood what compassion was… but I wanted to understand it better. So I looked up the true definition.
According to Merriam-Webster’s Dictionary, compassion is “sympathetic consciousness of others’ distress together with a desire to alleviate it.” I felt moved by this definition, as I hadn’t realized it had that second component to it. Not just a sympathetic awareness of the pain or struggle of another, but a genuine desire to make it better.
We see friends all the time who are struggling, and sympathetic people will feel sadness for them, but only a truly compassionate person will want to alleviate their pain. Now remember, having the desire to help them doesn’t necessarily mean we can, or will. There may be obstacles outside of our control that limit what we can do. But there is a desire, and the point is, there are ways to show compassion without “fixing the problem” or alleviating
their pain. It’s all based on our desire.
For instance, you see a homeless person on the side of the road, but you don’t have money or food that you can give them. But that doesn’t mean you can’t give them a smile, a kind word, or even sit and talk to them about who they are and how they ended up in their situation. That’s compassion. Treating
Compassion is a quality that anyone can possess. And if you feel it for others but never use it, then it’s a wasted gift that you’re depriving others of, and in turn, depriving yourself of the rewards of compassion, which, according to the Dalai Lama, is happiness and love.another person like a human being who probably doesn’t get it very often.
I spent this weekend at a retreat surrounded by a group of compassionate women, and I was able to share my own compassion with them. I felt love, and I felt happiness. It’s a gift I plan to give more freely, and explore more deeply.
What does compassion mean to you? When is the last time you felt compassionate towards someone, or even yourself? When was the last time someone showed you compassion?
