016-Buddhism in daily life - Compassion is a feeling

Have you ever passed a beggar who asked you for money, standing a
can in front of him, asking for a teuro with a suffering face?


Surely your feeling was "with" the suffering fellow, probably you
opened your heart, connected your mind with that of the other
person, at least for a short moment.


The teaching of Buddhism is about liberation from suffering,
about the absence of all causes of suffering. We all go through
the same path of suffering, the so-called path of suffering, go
through many things, birth, old age, illness, and in the end
death is waiting.


Therefore, we can "empathize", because the situation is the same
for all people, no one lives forever, everyone suffers pain,
everyone has their desires, their disappointments, their
successes, their "special" moments in life, which make up the
respective, individual path of life.


Perhaps you ask yourself briefly what could have brought the
beggar to ask you of all people for money here now, what stations
have tipped the scales that he and you meet at this very moment,
have a fleeting encounter. What has this person experienced,
which experiences were formative, possibly you feel a feeling
arise in you, the compassion. This is then usually connected with
the wish that this person can free himself from his predicament,
that he may free himself from the cycle of suffering.


Through the connection to this human being, in just this short
second, from this we draw strength, this coupling between living
beings is a small enlightenment, a feeling "with" the other
creature, with its vulnerability, which shows us our own pain and
suffering.


Compassion can be developed if one wants to. The opposite of
compassion is schadenfreude and spitefulness, which also stem in
part from our limited ability to "help", the feeling of being
able to do "nothing", that makes us very unhappy.


Compassion is an emotion, but it should be used wisely, because
giving up on ourselves out of compassion is not a smart solution
either. Also, we must not lose heart because of the many bad
events in this world, not despair at the badness we often
experience around us. For Buddha said that we should not judge,
not divide into "good" or "bad", but accept fate as it then
comes.


When you meditate again, you should direct your compassion to the
people you don't like, who make you uncomfortable, in doing so
you can strengthen your compassion.


Because again, the journey is the destination!





You can't have passion unless you have compassion


- Elizabeth Taylor - British-American actress - 1932 to 2011





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