My understanding is that aligning compassion with wisdom is to be compassionate purely, that is, be fully present with the person suffering and give what I give out of care for that person and responsiveness to that person and not for any ulterior agenda such as future reward. Compassion with wisdom is a care about the person out of identification with that person, realizing that we are one, that he or she is I and I am he or she. Compassion with wisdom allows and maintains freedom -- it encourages independence rather than dependence, as the author states. It is a love that sets one free, as Scripture speaks of, and not a love that binds by fostering dependence, debt, or guilt. Compassion with wisdom is open and free give and take, and if the compassion is with wisdom there is give and take on both sides. As for my 'doing it now,' what comes to mind is little acts of kindness that I have done such as to spontaneously pick up something for someone that he or she has dropped, when just a second or two of postponing would have been to lose the opportunity. Regarding the business of asking the trees and the wind, and watching the sun, to find out how I'm doing, my understanding is that all that is is one, and as such the trees are my lungs, the wind is my breath, the sun is my warmth, and if I live in that consciousness I can "find out" from them. The fact that that makes sense to me indicates for me my growth, but I'm not there, I don't live that way, and doubt I'll ever get there, but I can appreciate it and be touched by it. I wish well to Grace Damman and hope she will continue to gather and share lessons and wisdom from her accident, and I hope other doctors and the rest of us will learn those same important lessons.
On Jul 20, 2013 david doane wrote :
My understanding is that aligning compassion with wisdom is to be compassionate purely, that is, be fully present with the person suffering and give what I give out of care for that person and responsiveness to that person and not for any ulterior agenda such as future reward. Compassion with wisdom is a care about the person out of identification with that person, realizing that we are one, that he or she is I and I am he or she. Compassion with wisdom allows and maintains freedom -- it encourages independence rather than dependence, as the author states. It is a love that sets one free, as Scripture speaks of, and not a love that binds by fostering dependence, debt, or guilt. Compassion with wisdom is open and free give and take, and if the compassion is with wisdom there is give and take on both sides. As for my 'doing it now,' what comes to mind is little acts of kindness that I have done such as to spontaneously pick up something for someone that he or she has dropped, when just a second or two of postponing would have been to lose the opportunity. Regarding the business of asking the trees and the wind, and watching the sun, to find out how I'm doing, my understanding is that all that is is one, and as such the trees are my lungs, the wind is my breath, the sun is my warmth, and if I live in that consciousness I can "find out" from them. The fact that that makes sense to me indicates for me my growth, but I'm not there, I don't live that way, and doubt I'll ever get there, but I can appreciate it and be touched by it. I wish well to Grace Damman and hope she will continue to gather and share lessons and wisdom from her accident, and I hope other doctors and the rest of us will learn those same important lessons.