Buddhist Childrens Books

Buddhist Childrens Books

A Matter of Perspective

Let’s talk about the “C” word.

And let’s not hold back, no conservative restraints, no bleeding heart Hallmark card like bombastic drivel; just plain honest talk.

No I have not changed the flavor of The You Revolution I’m just having some fun. The “C” word I’m referring to here is Compassion.

What comes to mind when you hear that word? Do you see the sad faces of children who suffer with poverty and disease? Is it homeless, rail-thin, animals that float across your gray matter? We all have the capacity for compassion.

Do you include yourself when you think compassion? Are there pictures of all the people you come in contact with daily? Yes, even those who most annoy you or serve to bring up feelings of outrage. I see you wincing so let’s make a few assumptions to support the possibility of their inclusion.

First of all, I assume, that you are a human being experiencing all of the challenges that presents in terms of patience, openness, fluctuating hormones and energy, and the drives to survive and thrive. Next, most likely, you are acting out your role in a way that you learned to by watching others, reinforced by what has worked in the past.

Based on those assumptions here’s a news brief:

You are at all times doing your best even if you don’t feel you are.

So far so good. This being human stuff gets tricky when we think of ourselves as different than the others who share this time in time.

It’s a popular idea these days that we are all connected; we are all one. Globalization has made it easier to see how this could be so in a macro way. Imagining that we are all human with the same struggles inherent in that brings it down to a micro level.

Connected though we may be some will desire to be separate because they see cultural differences and not our similarities.

The ego’s job is to protect us and sometimes that means finding someone or something to blame for what we don’t like or see as wrong. History, our country’s present history included, supports my statement.

As smart midlifers we know that blaming gets us nowhere and making others wrong is a cop out and quite often leads to long, ugly conflicts.

Am I saying you should suffer fools gladly? Uh, yeah more or less. I’m not espousing doormat-ism or lobotomy to make “be and let be” with those others easier.

Just a bit of perspective might do.

What would it take to accept that we are all the same, bumbling along on the human journey, all of us suffering the dueling feelings of inadequacy and superiority?

How about the “C” word?

The roots of the word compassion, com- "together or with" + pati "to suffer" give us a possible interpretation of “suffering together or with another.”

Pema Chodron is a fully ordained Buddhist nun. The goal of her work is to apply Buddhist teachings in everyday life. She is irreverent and her messages are relevant for 21st century life. Tricycle magazine interviewed her after her book, Start Where You Are, A Guide To Compassionate Living came out. They asked her what cultivates genuine compassion. I love her answer.

“Genuine compassion comes from the fact that you see your own limitations: you wish to be kind and you find that you aren't kind. Then, instead of beating yourself up you see that that's what all human beings are up against and you begin to have some kind of genuine compassion for the human condition. And you see how challenging it is to be a human being.”

Challenging? Oh yea, and let me be the first to come clean. I have at least 4 billion thoughts a day that would send me to hell instantly if it worked that way. Feelings of frustration, prejudice, and resentment alternate and it’s usually because of “one of them.”

No big deal I’ve learned because feelings happen. What I/we do with those feelings is the big deal. Feeling the pain in a situation but not giving this pain out in the form of criticism or sarcasm is practicing compassion. In the minute it takes to breathe in and out and think about what’s come up, why we see the other as wrong or bad, is all it takes to remember to “feel with, to suffer with.” And oh how quickly the roles can be reversed. It’s all a matter or perspective no?

Pema Chodron’s interpretation of the Buddhist concept of suffering is not that something happens to us but that we tend to make matters worse with our thoughts.

This is taken from a transcript which can be found at her website. “…think of the root of suffering as this tendency to make matters worse, this tendency to buy into the same old story lines and the same old blaming and the same old resentment mind, bitter mind, judgmental mind, self-pitying mind, whatever it might be. The tendency to make matters worse being the root of suffering. Because, as I say, even if what your suffering is is that you have a genuine great loss, the root of it turning into debilitating suffering is what we do with that, how we spin off from that. Am I making this clear?”

Loud and clear.

And that’s what I’ll be reminding myself when I’m feeling like I didn’t do enough or I get P.O’d at some “other” for some fabricated difference.

I’ll practice the “C” word and remind myself that I’m the smartest person in the world next to you.

About the Author

Gregory Anne Cox is a certified life coach who has been
dishing up all-you-can-eat servings of women's health and
nutrition information for years. Her

Visit her site at

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