Compassion
(This is an excerpt from University Of Metaphysical Sciences course at www.umsonline.org, please feel free to visit the school website)
Compassion is a sympathy and desire to help the suffering of others. Compassion arises with an open heart. A natural way to express this is through giving. Mother Teresa said, “To me, God and compassion are one and the same. Compassion is the joy of sharing. It’s doing the small things for the love of each other—just a smile, or carrying a bucket of water, or showing some simple kindness…the fruit of love is service, which is compassion in action.” Compassion is the willingness to open our hearts to one another.
Suggestions: collect stories of people offering hope and help in times of crisis. Take children out into the community to look for ways people are involved in helping others. Share stories of great teacher, Jesus, Buddha, Ghandi, Martin Luther King Jr., or Mother Teresa. One way to nourish the seeds of compassion is to encourage children to unclutter their minds. Use prayer, guided imagery, relaxation and silence to help clear a child’s mind. In their imaginations, children can meet God in whatever form God speaks to them, talk to angels, or fly across the world to bring love and flowers of peace where they are needed. The limitations of time and space disappear in the realm of prayer and holy contemplation.
“Open your eyes and look for some man, or some work for the sake of men, which needs a little time, a little friendship, a little sympathy, a little sociability, a little human toil. It is needed in every nook and corner. Therefore search and see if there is not some place where you may invest your humanity.”
—Albert Schweitzer
Recipe for Success: To laugh often and much; to win the respect of intelligent people and the affection of children; to earn the appreciation of honest critics and endure the betrayal of false friends; to appreciate beauty; to find the best in others: to leave the world a bit better, whether by a healthy child, a garden patch, or a redeemed social condition; to know even one life has breathed easier because you lived, this is to have succeeded.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson