Showing Compassion

Here’s an excerpt from a longer post I just added to LinkedIn on showing compassion:

Compassion is both an emotional response to suffering, and a call to action to reduce that suffering. In these times especially, showing compassion is enormously important.

The literature on compassion consistently points to these strategies:

• Avoiding judgment – When our default is to place blame, to be competitive, or to react automatically, it is hard to show compassion for others. To avoid judging, change the questions you ask yourself from “What’s wrong with them?” to “What are they thinking, feeling and wanting?” “What can we learn from this situation?” or “What’s the best thing to do now?”
• Recognizing common bonds – Now, more than ever, we need to focus on what we have in common with others – not what divides us. Start with the fact that we’re all trying to do our best, that we all want to be happy, and that we’ve all experienced loss.
• Practicing self-compassion - You can’t effectively show compassion for others if you are beating yourself up. Be kind and generous to yourself. I’ll let the Buddha have the bottom line on this one. Buddha said, “If your compassion doesn’t include yourself, it is incomplete.” Who’s going to argue with the Buddha?

The full blog post is here: https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/compassion-turbulent-times-sophie-oberstein