A few days ago I pleaded everyone to bring more compassion into the world

As we seem to face increasing turmoil and tension in the world, my plea was about just how can we learn from the events of the last few years to bring more compassion into the world?

A few weeks ago I attended a workshop about compassion at the Brahma Kumaris World Spiritual University. It was quite an inspirational afternoon, and certainly left all of us feeling more compassionate towards ourselves and each other.

As we live in a world increasingly dominated by the internet, more and more people can be informed rapidly about worthy causes and disasters which need our urgent attention. Online petitions and blogs such as this one have become a powerful way of informing people and spreading a message.

Online and offline petitions are a growing trend – they do bring about change but can also disempower as people then feel that they have done their bit.

The question we have to ask is whether compassion is innately within us or is it learnt?

For example, when we hear about starving kids in Asia or Africa, one may well ask what it has to do with me?

Compassion arises with a change of perspective about who we really are and our relationship to the rest of the world.

In the mid-seventies, Betty Williams in Ireland set up an organisation soon after hearing that some children had been shot during the Northern Ireland conflict. She cried – “what kind of people have we become to allow our children to be killed in the streets?”

Within 4 hours, she had galvanised her community and had soon collected 16,000 names in a petition. She later went on to win the Nobel peace prize.

We don’t have to wait to carry out major acts of compassion either. Though we all have the potential to be a mother Teresa, we can begin today through small acts of kindness and compassion in our own world.

Sometimes, it takes something like a major event like Tsunami in Dec 2004 or Katrina before our compassion is awakened. Those events generated an incredible amount of compassion and action world-wide but it did not last long. I wondered whether it was compassion fatigue or just a pit stop.

So how does one go about bringing more compassion into our life and into the world?

The first act of compassion is to look at our own needs firsts. Then develop the inner power for the 3C’s – Care, Compassion and Crying in public. By crying in public it is meant being willing and being vulnerable to show your kindness and compassion to the world - being willing to be raw and able to show your humanity.

To get you started today on bringing more compassion into your world and the world at large, here are the simple exercises from the workshop I attended:

1. Think about an event / act of compassion you carried out.

Ask your self -what qualities are already in me to allow me to be compassionate?

E.g kindness, empathy, love, sympathy, goodness, listening, understanding and so on.

2. We are all compassionate and we all have examples where we have been compassionate. But what about the other side?

Think of an incident when you were NOT compassionate.

What characteristics were you showing then?

E.g being judgemental, thoughtlessness, being selfish.

3. Then ask yourself what is stoppping you from being more compassionate.

What qualities do I have that stops me from being more compassionate?

E.g. impatience, being judegmental

Remember to be kind and compassionate to yourself when answering this question!

4. Ask yourself what qualities you would like to have more of in your life.

What qualities would make me more compassionate?

E.g. patience, understanding.

5. Finally, have the intention to be more compassionate today and every day from now on.

What will you do today to be more compassionate?

For example:-

• Enjoy quality time with family and show them more understanding
• Thank friend and stop judging him / her.
• Be in gratitude for what I have.
• Stop beating myself up! Remember, compassion begins at home.
• Arrange party at home for friends to show my appreciation of them

Enjoy bringing more compassion today into your life. Just by having read these words, you have already started.

Now what will YOU do today to bring more compassion in the world today?

Please leave your comments below and share them with the world. Your actions are certain to inspire many others. Thank you.