AID TO COMPASSION

Compassion is tied to the fundamental teaching of Buddhism that all sentient beings suffer.  To be alive is to suffer.

In his book The Compassionate Life, His Holiness the Dalai Lama explained compassion this way:

“True compassion is not just an emotional response but a firm commitment founded on reason.  Because of this firm foundation, a truly compassionate attitude toward others does not change even if they (the others) behave negatively. 

“Genuine compassion is based not on our own projections and expectation, but rather on the needs of the other:  irrespective of whether another person is a close friend or an enemy, as long as that person wishes for peace and happiness and wishes to overcome suffering, then on that basis we develop genuine concern for their problem.  This is genuine compassion.”

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Realistically, however, it may be difficult to feel compassion for other human beings, especially if, as the Dalai Lama put it, they behave negatively, if they are miserable, harmful, destructive people.  Even if they are peaceful, kind, helpful people we still may not like them for some reason; we cannot, do not feel compassion toward them.

What is required is a change of attitude to where we do not see other people as persons, as identities.  An identity is a conditioned illusion, not who an individual actually is. 

Remove identity from the equation and what is left is who the individual really is, strictly an organism. They are no different than a cat, a tree, or a snail this way.  We more readily feel compassion toward something if we see them as organisms alone. 

An even easier aid to compassion is the view in Vedanta that everything is Brahman, God.  We have compassion for others because we are all the same thing.