How to Practice Compassion
Compassion is a word thrown around a lot today, but what is it, and how do you cultivate it? The dictionary defines compassion as "sympathetic pity and concern for the sufferings or misfortunes of others." This definition does not include the first step to gaining a compassionate perspective, self-compassion. It is easier to cultivate compassion for others if you have compassion for yourself first. Self-compassion means turning down the volume on your inner critic and turning your compassion inward.
"Compassion for others begins with kindness to ourselves." - Pema Chodron
Once you master self-compassion, you can extend it to others. In Buddhism, compassion is the wish for another being to be free of suffering and the causes of suffering. To empathize with someone suffering, you must put yourself in someone else's shoes and move beyond your own personal grief. To do this, you must practice awareness of yourself and others and plan to face problems together.
"You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view. Until you climb inside of this skin and walk around in it" - Harper Lee
You can learn to develop compassion if you aren't naturally inclined to be that way. To build compassion, you will want to limit the scope of it to the real people you encounter in life. So first, start with self-compassion and then let that radiate to your closest friends and family members. Once you get the hang of it, widen your scope to include your co-workers. Once that feels comfortable, include the people you encounter every day. Continue widening your compassion scope until it includes everyone in the world. This may sound unrealistic, but start today and start on a small scale. Train your compassion and extend it to everyone, including people you like, strangers, and even people you do not like. Continue in this fashion until your compassion includes everyone in the entire world.
Below are steps on how to practice compassion:
Speak kindness
Apologize when you have made a mistake
Listen carefully without judgment and actively listen
Encourage and support other people
Offer help and assistance to someone with a task
Be happy for someone else's success
Accept people for who they are
Show respect to everyone
Forgive other people for making mistakes
Express gratitude and appreciation
Be patient
Practice presence
Why should you practice compassion? Compassion is a great reason to go easier on yourself and others. One step further, it's an excuse to show love and kindness to others because you never know what's going on in someone's life. Appearances are often wrong. People may not tell you the whole truth, and rarely do people post the negative aspects of their life on social media. You must know that no matter who the person is, how much money they have, or their status in life, we all suffer. There's no escaping our suffering in life. Some may suffer more or less than others, but they still suffer. Suffering is a natural part of the human experience. You do not have to understand the details or know how much someone suffers to show compassion. Whether you like it or not, we are in this life together, and compassion is just one way to relate to and care for others. Your compassion towards someone could change the trajectory of that particular moment or day or even extend to their entire life. People rarely forget kindness, especially when it's genuinely given and uniquely felt. Compassion inspires other people, and whether you are the recipient or the giver, it will inspire you too.
I adopted an older woman from the local nursing home as my surrogate grandmother in high school. I called her "Meme." I visited her three times a week and invited her to my family's celebration of Thanksgiving and Christmas at my house. She had no family in town and soon became a part of ours. I can't begin to explain how happy it made me to pick her up at the nursing home and bring her home with me. Meme attended my Senior play of "Bye Bye Birdie" and my High School Graduation ceremony. This tradition continued for several years until she sadly passed away when I was a Junior in college. As I think about Bertha Dorris I have tears of gratitude. Oh, how much I loved her! I can never forget how much she loved me. This small act of compassion brought joy and laughter into her life and brought purpose and meaning into mine. You'll never regret a compassionate moment. At least, I never have. My best memories are wrapped up in the concept of compassion.
"Sometimes it takes only one act of kindness and caring to change a person's life" - Jackie Chan