Quote:
Originally Posted by Abby
Every day your update elicit so many questions I want to ask. I think most of all I want to know more, to understand better.
Compassion is a topic close to my heart because for a long time I didn't understand or believe in it. I believed in kindness and care, but not compassion (and this is despite being given a lot of love and care as a child). I couldn't believe that anyone would really want to or be willing to take the time to feel my suffering with me, not truly in any continuous meaningful way. In fact, writing this just now I wonder if this is what my therapist has been saying for years when she's said "I'm alongside you". Literally for years (and in many ways this continues) her saying this was meaningless for me, it was just words. Then she told me that there is some pain where all someone can do is be there until it settles. I understood that. To me that is compassion, to stay. I thought about that when you wrote that you went back to see the homeless man, he said "you came back, no one comes back".
I'm sorry for writing so much, I'm sure you have enough to read. I hope you have a lovely time with your friend. Enjoy!
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Hi Abby,
feel free to write as much as you like and to ask whatever question you would like to ask.
Compassion is a really big topic for me too. I believe that compassion is when you can look at a situation or someone and you can feel a little bit of what that situation feels like (or what the person may feel like).
It's to not look away and offer yourself. That works with compassion towards ourselves as well as for others.
People sometimes say: "I have to look at my own life first before I can look at someone else's life." I think that is true and false at the same time. True in the way that it is okay
for a while to accept that it is all about me, that I can find compassion for myself now and for what I have gone through in the past. Accepting that it is okay to be the receiver of care and love and compassion for a while and believing I am worth that.
And it is false too because looking at our own lives almost always forces us to look at others. And I strongly believe that in order to heal from whatever we need to be healed - small things or big things, we need to find compassion for others in our hearts. Because if we are capable of compassion, we are capable of looking beyond our troubles, which I believe gives us insight into ourselves.
It's not just about saying it, is about feeling it. Feeling compassion from others and towards others.
When I see someone in distress, it is almost impossible for me to look away. I don't know why, I have never been able to find an explanation. Perhaps I am just not tough enough. But when I look back, many situations when I didn't look away have turned into something great.
When I quit my job at the TV station and I wasn't sure what I would do next, I sat on the tram one day across an elderly lady who was crying. I asked her if I could help her and what made her so sad. She told me her husband had passed away and they would always ride the tram together through the city and now she is making the journey all by herself. We talked a little bit and she asked me what I did for a living. I told her that I had just quit my job but that I had earned my photography degree recently and that I might want to do something with that. She got very excited and opened her bag and pulled out a little digital camera her son had given her for Christmas. And before I knew what was happening she asked me questions about the settings on the camera, how to take better pictures etc.. I spent an hour with her riding the tram back and forth and explaining the camera to her.
I knew when we parted what I was going to do. A few weeks later I formed my own teaching company, teaching elderly people in photography, computer skills, photoshop. This company is still going strong and one of the major creative ventures for older people in the area. (I don't want to publicly say the name of the company, but feel free to pm me if you want to know more)
So compassion led to something new. If I had looked away, I would never have come up with the idea and would never have had that wonderful job that made me so very happy and changed the life of hundreds of elderly people who now have made new friends, for the first time in their life held huge public exhibitions and many have come out of utter isolation.
And I got to hear many incredible stories of long, interesting lives, which made me richer and a much better person.
It is hard to find the spark sometimes, that makes us reach out for compassion or give compassion. But I believe if we risk it, it can become huge inspiration and make our lives a thousand times better.