Fayerody --

The notion that one can have "too much compassion" is interesting. I'm not sure that "doing for others" always comes from compassion. In fact, some of the most genuinely compassionate people I know are extremely good at drawing boundaries so that other people don't abuse and wear them out.

I think that people -- especially women and children who were abused -- grow up trying to please people. People-pleasing, as it's called. And part of that is looking after other people's needs, even to the extent of neglecting our own needs.

I'm not saying that nurturing others that stems from people-pleasing doesn't include a dimension of true caring and concern, even love in some situations.

Here is the Wikipidia definition (not that wiki is any great source for understanding the nuances of language):<font color="blue}

Compassion is a sense of shared suffering, most often combined with a desire to alleviate or reduce such suffering.

Compassionate acts are generally considered those which take into account the suffering of others and attempt to alleviate that suffering as if it were ones own. In this sense, the various forms of the Golden Rule are clearly based in the concept of compassion.

Compassion differs from other forms of helpful or humane behavior in that its focus is primarily on the alleviation of suffering. Acts of kindness which seek primarily to confer benefit rather than relieve existing suffering are better classified as acts of altruism, although, in this sense, compassion itself can be seen as a subset of altruism, it being defined as the type of behavior which seeks to benefit others by reducing their suffering.[/color">

I think that a lot of the people-pleasing behavior falls in the altruism category -- addressing the outer effects of the suffering because addressing the inner sources is so difficult. I also think -- at least for me -- being busy "helping others" is an escape from addressing my own deepest issues and wounds, and helping myself.

In another recent thread, I suggested that we cannot be compassionate toward others if we are not compassionate toward ourselves. Someone argued that of course we can be compassionate toward others if we are not compassionate toward ourselves, and I agreed.

But there is still a part of me that wonders if this is true, at the deepest level. Perhaps we feel sympathy, empathy, pity -- but I wonder if what we feel is compassion, at least at the deepest purest level. I am holding as my model examples such as the Buddha, such as Mother Teresa -- where no exceptions are made in demonstrating compassion toward others.

The kind of compassion I'm thinking of, and trying to learn, comes from a deeply spiritual, soul place. It is that individual who has a "healing presence" (HP). That person with HP may not have a piece of bread to give the hungry person. But the heart is so open, so compassionate, so healing that just being in the presence of HP relieves the suffering (not the hunger, the inner heartfelt suffering) of the hungry person and the heart lifts, transcends the outer experience of hunger.

Yes, I had that experience of being in the healing presence of a compassionate person and having my spirit lift at word, at a touch -- with absolutely nothing in the outer changing.

I believe (at least until this argument move forward and I change my mind) that one has to demonstrate compassion toward oneself first, before one can be a compassionate healing presence. In other words, I am seeing compassion as a way of being rather than a way of doing.

If a person says, "I am compassionate toward abused children, but I have no mercy for the rapist, the murderer, the torturer," I would agree that one has achieved a degree of compassion but the heart still has places that are hard.

If the place in my heart that is hard is toward myself, I think that creates a lot of problems in demonstrating true compassion. I think we are functioning from altruism and people-pleasing until we can give ourselves the mercy, too.

At any rate, these are the ideas that I am working with these days, so I'm grateful for anyone who had time and interest to add to the dialogue.