Compassion "Revisited"

[Fred Steeves]

Hi everybody, the main reason I asked for the "Compassion" thread to be closed down, is because when I came back to Avalon after my silly ass retirement, it was with the deep understanding that I was never again going to be the cause of any division here. I was returning as a peace maker. Lesson learned...

Well, the thread wound up causing division, and worst of all, amongst some of the people I love and respect the most at Avalon. The best I knew to do was to simply ask for it to be over, the old just quit digging thing. I assure ya'll it was nothing anyone in particular said to whomever, at any given point, it was the overall energy that I wished to be cut short.

While I have the soap box,:p the point of the thread was not to pin down and define "compassion", mainly because I think that's chasing phantoms. I don't think it can be done, and one winds up just running around in circles. The point was personal experience to Know it, to Know it so deeply that the "Teacher" in the OP would know the lesson was learned, merely from the look in the seeker's eyes. No words necessary.

Now I'm laughing at myself, as that sounds like a rather self defeating premise for a comment forum doesn't it? These things are so damn subtle. Like, if I asked someone here: "Show me grief". Well we can dance around the ins and outs of grief can't we, maybe even share some of what a great teacher has said concerning grief. But, let me be looking into your eyes at the mention of your loss of a dear loved one, and I will know that you Know grief.

So, being that I seem to have a penchant fou "revisiting" threads (LOL), I'll try it again here. Maybe we're just done with it, but maybe not. Dunno. If we're already done with this one then so be it, it can just drift off into thread never never land. No biggie.

Not even sure how to phrase this topic any more, why don't you decide. Let er rip. Fred steps down off of the soap box, but leaves it behind for whoever else may want it. http://www.bigtenfever.com/forums/images/smilies/cheers.gif

Cheers!

[Carmen]

Compassion - detached empathetic understanding. A heart connection of 'knowing', the recognition and honouring of another's journey.

[lookbeyond]

Beautiful

lookbeyond

[ulli]

Poor Fred. Poor, poor Fred.
Poor you. Look into my eyes. I mean it.
Is this what you had in mind, Fred?

Today is one of those perfect days where I feel love for all
and compassion with all.
But I can't guarantee that it will last.
Not saying that I'm bipolar, ok?

But I have to confess that there are mood swings, on occasion.
What about your compassion level, Fred?
Does that fluctuate, or is it always at peak performance?

[Limor Wolf]

Fred, I like your true colors.

[Sierra]

Hi Fred,

<shrugging helplessly>

:hug: :kiss:

Sorry 'bout dat. Forgive me, I am so sorry, I love you (dearly), thank you (so much that you came back!).

Sierra :wave:

[another bob]

Here's an excerpt from a discussion between Bob Thruman and Karen Armstrong from the program Global Spirit.

Karen Armstrong was a Catholic nun and she has written a very well received book on Buddhism along with 11 similar books on other religions and comparative religion.

Robert Thurman is a Tibetean Buddhist teacher well known in the West and worldwide. Though to some people he is better known as Uma Thurman's father.

Talking about compassion and exchanging the orientation of "self and other" in our view of things.



ZXGDj9KODGY

[Belle]

*getting up on soapbox*

I'm so sorry the original thread degenerated...and so quickly. Once it started, it was hard not to get caught up in making snide remarks...I apologize for my part in that, and hope that by editing my smarmy post I may have redeemed myself somewhat...my conscience would not allow me to let it stand and kept bugging me until edited.

So here we are. Now what?

I like your description using grief in place of compassion, Fred. Most of us have lost people who had been close to us, Know grief, and can easily recognize it in others without their saying a word. Whereas compassion...not as clearly seen, known, or Known...which is why I believe it became easy to fall into the trap of defining compassion, quote what others have said about compassion, attempting to teach and/or share personal stories of compassion in action, etc. when the point of the thread was the difference between knowing and Knowing.

I, for one, would like to see a discussion about the difference between knowing and Knowing that allows space for whatever examples posters feel relevant. jmo.

I'm hoping by creating a reset, you have made us more aware of what makes a thread degenerate and all of us can work at keep the energy levels up. Now that would be a great lesson learned, if possible, that could spread to the rest of the forum.

Thank you.

*stepping down*

Next....

[normam2]

http://ophid.utoronto.ca/ophidv2.201/spotlight6desc.jsp (pic won't upload but here is the link)


While taking a Developmental genetics class the professor showed us a picture of how genes interact and signal each other to carry out a function. This pictures always comes to mind when thinking about emotions because I think that when we are feeling an emotion and we label it as such and such we are in fact feeling several components that we classified as a single emotion (eg compassion, sadness , happiness) .
Sometimes the emotion is quite intense so it's hard to tune in and deconstruct it into smaller feelings . For instance , here a white square could be compassion which is affected by interaction of yet other emotions ( some that we have labels for , some to which we don't )

Just my two cents

Isabel

[Camilo]

Then lets call this one forgiveness, as nobody's perfect, and we human all make mistakes voluntarily or otherwise.

[yuhui]

Dzongsar Khyentse Rinpoche talks about nondual compassion from the teaching on Madhyamakavatara


IBIe5D5Oqh4

[NancyV]

Hi everybody, the main reason I asked for the "Compassion" thread to be closed down, is because when I came back to Avalon after my silly ass retirement, it was with the deep understanding that I was never again going to be the cause of any division here. I was returning as a peace maker. Lesson learned...
Fred, I have great compassion and empathy with you because of your desire to control how others perceive your words and because you think you actually can be the "cause" of any division, although I think it's also delightfully silly. I also indulge in that fantasy upon occasion...and it's okay. It's part of being human and thinking we have control.

Well, the thread wound up causing division, and worst of all, amongst some of the people I love and respect the most at Avalon. The best I knew to do was to simply ask for it to be over, the old just quit digging thing. I assure ya'll it was nothing anyone in particular said to whomever, at any given point, it was the overall energy that I wished to be cut short.
Some of us humans LOVE to debate and act as the "devils advocate". It's just a game and this is just an illusion. You can't cause any division and you can't control others games, but you CAN try! That's a fun game too. :fencing:

While I have the soap box,:p the point of the thread was not to pin down and define "compassion", mainly because I think that's chasing phantoms. I don't think it can be done, and one winds up just running around in circles. The point was personal experience to Know it, to Know it so deeply that the "Teacher" in the OP would know the lesson was learned, merely from the look in the seeker's eyes. No words necessary.
The lesson is never learned, it is only experienced, yet when it is experienced it is no longer "compassion"...it just IS... You can take my word for it 'cause I'm RIGHT!
:haha:


Now I'm laughing at myself, as that sounds like a rather self defeating premise for a comment forum doesn't it? These things are so damn subtle. Like, if I asked someone here: "Show me grief". Well we can dance around the ins and outs of grief can't we, maybe even share some of what a great teacher has said concerning grief. But, let me be looking into your eyes at the mention of your loss of a dear loved one, and I will know that you Know grief.
If we know ourselves we already know "others". We know their grief, their joy, their pain, their sillinesses. <~~~~~(is that a word?) We are all one. "Other" is just an illusion in this game. We don't have to remember or pretend that we're all one here, 'cause it's very hard to do! When we go to other dimensions we can more easily join with "other" parts of ourselves that seem to be separated in this dream/illusion. Then as we gather more parts back together we finally join back with Source, which is also me/you/all of us. Then we do this game all over again!


So, being that I seem to have a penchant fou "revisiting" threads (LOL), I'll try it again here. Maybe we're just done with it, but maybe not. Dunno. If we're already done with this one then so be it, it can just drift off into thread never never land. No biggie.

Not even sure how to phrase this topic any more, why don't you decide. Let er rip. Fred steps down off of the soap box, but leaves it behind for whoever else may want it. http://www.bigtenfever.com/forums/images/smilies/cheers.gif

Cheers!
Yep I like your penchant for revisiting threads. It gives me a nice chuckle. I have great compassion for us, you and me and all of us who are me, which is everybody. I like the way you are and I don't want to change things about you that are not how I am in this body. I get to enjoy who you are without having to think about being that way myself right now. And since you are me I'm also the same as you, and I believe we ALL have compassion, so we do all have it, because since I have it so do you, and everyone else, because we're all one!...oops, now I'm getting confused. Better quit while I'm behind.
:wave::lalala::clap2:

[Fred Steeves]

I like your description using grief in place of compassion, Fred. Most of us have lost people who had been close to us, Know grief, and can easily recognize it in others without their saying a word. Whereas compassion...not as clearly seen, known, or Known...which is why I believe it became easy to fall into the trap of defining compassion, quote what others have said about compassion, attempting to teach and/or share personal stories of compassion in action, etc. when the point of the thread was the difference between knowing and Knowing.

I, for one, would like to see a discussion about the difference between knowing and Knowing that allows space for whatever examples posters feel relevant. jmo.


Hi Belle. The more I contemplate this knowing vs. Knowing of compassion, the more it steers me away from the conspiracy angle. Not that it's not important to know about, certainly it is, but it would seem it is more just a catalyst for us to truly spread our "wings" and transcend it, not endlessly explore, and therefore become lost down every little rabbit hole.

I'm not talking about the usual New Age ascension stuff, I'm talking about a grand "Coming To Terms With One's Self", so to speak. To truly do this thing requires going to some very dark places, places we would all prefer to think are not a part of our being.

I'm thinking that when the cycle rolls around again for us to have a chance at taking that deep look within once more, we will either wind up in self destruction at what we "see", because either we cannot, or will not accept this. Or, we finally are able to forgive ourselves, thereby setting ourselves free from our own self inflicted bondage. I know I'm retreading old ground now, but I'm thinking that once we cross that boundary of self forgiveness, we then have the realization that all was already forgiven from the word go. There was never anything to forgive.

As the line in "Silent Lucidity" says: "A roundtrip journey in your head".
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Now bringing things full circle, once we have accepted and forgiven the ultimate tyrant, which is ourselves, do we not right then and there have compassion upon ourselves, at how hopelessly lost we were?

If that answer is a "yes", then the person is likely catching the drift that we are all really One. This is also a Knowing, not a knowing. Once this is Known through direct experience, how can we not forgive, and therefore show compassion to others? Knowing They are also Us.

Fred stops rambling, and passes the soap box...

[Eram]

Yep I like your penchant for revisiting threads. It gives me a nice chuckle. I have great compassion for us, you and me and all of us who are me, which is everybody. I like the way you are and I don't want to change things about you that are not how I am in this body. I get to enjoy who you are without having to think about being that way myself right now. And since you are me I'm also the same as you, and I believe we ALL have compassion, so we do all have it, because since I have it so do you, and everyone else, because we're all one!...oops, now I'm getting confused. Better quit while I'm behind.
:wave::lalala::clap2:


so.......... I wrote this too? :unsure:

cool!!!

I knew I had it in me.... somewhere. :bounce:


edit to add:

My girlfriend just came up to me to say that she had a little revelation just now, in the other room in which she saw that we are all each other.
how about that synchro... :P

[another bob]

...oops, now I'm getting confused.

You are one of the least confused folks I've ever met, Sister, and Thank You for your sanity and sense of humor (which are not two separate things)!

:yo:

¤=[Post Update]=¤



My girlfriend just came up to me to say that she had a little revelation just now, in the other room in which she saw that we are all each other.
how about that synchro... :P

Hugs to Marieke!


http://i46.tinypic.com/206lo4y.gif

[Elly]

Now bringing things full circle, once we have accepted and forgiven the ultimate tyrant, which is ourselves, do we not right then and there have compassion upon ourselves, at how hopelessly lost we were?

If that answer is a "yes", then the person is likely catching the drift that we are all really One. This is also a Knowing, not a knowing. Once this is Known through direct experience, how can we not forgive, and therefore show compassion to others? Knowing They are also Us.

Wow Fred, I feel you have pinpointed something very important there. Beautiful.

[Jenci]

Now bringing things full circle, once we have accepted and forgiven the ultimate tyrant, which is ourselves, do we not right then and there have compassion upon ourselves, at how hopelessly lost we were?

If that answer is a "yes", then the person is likely catching the drift that we are all really One. This is also a Knowing, not a knowing. Once this is Known through direct experience, how can we not forgive, and therefore show compassion to others? Knowing They are also Us.

Fred stops rambling, and passes the soap box...

Yes Fred but there is still more to compassion for us to know and experience if we want to go further.

It's most likely that when we experience this compassion, however powerful it may feel, there will be a story attached to it; a story about "Me".

There's nothing wrong with this but to the earnest spiritual seeker there may still be a yearning for a deeper, greater experience and if they pay attention and they are sincere they may be able to notice the story about "me" very subtely attached to the experience of compassion.

The story could be about how I feel watching suffering, about how I fear the same happening to me, about how I am thanking my lucky stars it is not me, about how I know I couldn't cope with what they are enduring, about how I feel I need to be doing or saying the right thing, about how I can't bear to watch them suffer....or any other possibilities which relate back to "me".

So you see even in the most selfless of emotions, compassion, we can find the self seeking if we pay close attention.

Once this story about Me which is attached to compassion is seen through and falls away, then compassion becomes impersonal and the experience of it enters a new level.


The video posted by Yuhui above about "non-dual compassion" is also teaching about this.


Jeanette

[another bob]

So you see even in the most selfless of emotions, compassion, we can find the self seeking if we pay close attention.

Very perceptive, Sister!


http://www.shambhalasun.com/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=1832


Whether we call it compassion, love, caring or a Buddhist term such as bodhicitta, it means the same thing: that in your actions, speech and thought you put others before yourself. Some of us practice meditation to achieve this understanding; others are able to understand this without formal meditation. But no matter how good compassion sounds when you talk about it, it really comes down to practicing it. And no one understands you as well as you do. You need the wisdom to look inward to see what kind of a person you are.

Compassion means letting go of your self-identity, letting go of proving that identity all the time. Compassion means you work in the way the wind works, the sun works, or the air works. Take, for example, how the air assumes the shape of the room. The air does not say, “I will give you this breathing space provided you breathe the way I want.” Everyone enjoys the benefit of being able to breathe in the air. It is the same way with the sun: the sun does not stop shining when there are clouds in the sky.

In that same way, selflessness free from attachment, or compassion used with wisdom, means that one goes beyond the way you want to do things. If you can let go of making yourself the most important person in the world, there will be more capacity and spaciousness within you to work with others. You will find more space, time and energy within yourself.