Love, Compassion and a Lot of Humility

In a recent post at Monk at Work, Adam Kayce presents some interesting food for thought. He says that connecting with your own purpose and passion isn’t the same as connecting with the Divine.

He doesn’t say how you can tell the difference, but it doesn’t matter. My own view of spirituality is more simple and more direct. I agree with the Dalai Lama that we can’t know about the Divine, and that the purpose of human life is happiness, which comes from having love and compassion for one another. He also says the greatest teachers aren’t the gurus, but people who teach others the experience of unconditional love.

Since I believe that, I’m forced to admit that I fall far short of some of my greatest role models…dogs. And I’m not alone in thinking of animals as teachers. A recent Beliefnet article is about how horses, cats and dogs have inspired people. One woman refers to her dog “…as my furry Buddha. Before he came into our lives, there was a hole within me that I couldn’t quite fill up. I looked into different spiritualities, donated my time to different organizations, and tried different hobbies. All were learning experiences and often enjoyable, but they never quite filled me. Days after Donnelly arrived, I realized the searching and the ache were subsiding. I now have direction and focus, and I have an understanding of what unconditional love really is. Thanks to Donnelly, I have discovered a passion for helping animals, and I have found fulfillment working to make their lives better.”

Amen to that.

About compassion…I’ll never be able to think of that word again without this picture filling my mind. (I can’t publish it here because of copyright restrictions.) The 9-year-old boy is bald because of chemotherapy, but he looks like a Buddhist monk. His head is resting on a very sick dog, and he’s holding the dog’s ear. His mother had been taking him to the local shelter on weekends to spend time with the animals there. The boy bonded with one frightened dog, so the mother brought the dog home “just for the weekend.” The first night the dog became so sick they had to rush him to the emergency room. That was the night the picture was taken. Needless to say, the dog never went back to the shelter. And five years later they’re both doing fine.

So…love, compassion and a lot of humility. That’s my spiritual practice. What about you? Do you have one? Or are you doing just fine without one? This site is about sharing, so please tell us your thoughts in the comment section below.

Picture of dog by Aaron Honey.

This entry was posted in Following the Path, Happiness, Living Fully. Bookmark the permalink.

16 Responses to Love, Compassion and a Lot of Humility

  1. Shirley says:

    What a wonderful article! The boy/dog picture will definitely stay in my mind. I’ve read the Dali Lama’s book “The Art of Happiness,” and found much of his advice useful. It’s hard to put advice on happiness into words, but unconditional love, compassion, and for me, gratitude, certainly pave the way.

  2. biren shah says:

    dear jean,
    i sense (and this comes from having seen and listened to people with a deep silence to sense the undercurrents) that happiness is a place that can be reached through many roads.
    i would agree on the ‘love’ part, and question the compassion part.
    happiness comes from love – love that fills your heart – which can come when you love people, or work, or a thing/creation.
    love is connecting with someone or something so totally that the experience is of expansion of self.
    i say this because i have seen people happy – really happy – when they are one with their work too. or people who become one with a moment or one with nature.
    some of this people had no particular affinity for people. not that they hated people, but were just not on that plane of existence.

    haven’t we all seen such people? singing merrily as they engage with their beloved – their work? and THEN, from this happiness, they are able to hug someone lovingly, or playfully tousle a tramp kids hair.

  3. Jean says:

    Thanks for commenting, biren. We certainly agree about happiness coming from love. To me compassion is just another form of love. It’s the realization that we’re not alone when things go wrong. No matter how much the mother loved her son going through chemo, it wasn’t the same as his sharing the experience of sickness with the dog. It may be that some people don’t need that. They might put more of an emphasis on having courage, say, than sharing their sadness with others.

    In Happiness, the Purpose of Life? I mention that just love and compassion isn’t quite enough for me, I need a certain challenge in my life. I agree with Joseph Campbell that I need a resonance between what I’m doing in the world and my “innermost being and reality”. Even though I didn’t know how to say it when I was a kid, I felt this discontinuity. I loved my family deeply, but that wasn’t enough. That’s what got me searching at an early age.

    So, what about you? What do you love? What fills your heart and expands your soul? As I mentioned in the post, this site is about sharing, so I appreciate your taking the time to do that.

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  5. Jenny Ryan says:

    My 3 fur babies definitely help increase my capacity for love!

  6. Liara Covert says:

    I agree that animals offer a lot of wisdom if human beings choose to learn from it. Animals are known to have heightened sensitivities, to be able to see and hear what many humans convince themselves they’re unable to do. In this way, animals set positive examples to inspire and stretch ourselves further to realize new levels of potential. Readers may enjoy this post:http://blog.dreambuilders.com.au/journal/2007/7/11/angel-retriever.html

  7. Hey Jean, another great post. My spiritual practice is very similar, but with one small twist – I’m just practicing love and compassion for myself at the moment. And strangely, the more of it I have for myself, the more natural it becomes to be loving and compassionate for others. I have to tell myself to be loving to myself, but when it happens for others, it comes naturally – no forcing, or remembering to.

    Cheers,
    Albert
    UrbanMonk.Net
    Modern personal development, entwined with ancient spirituality.

  8. Jean says:

    Thanks to everyone who came by!

    Albert,
    Your comment really resonated. A major breakthrough came for me when I was in my mid-twenties and noticed I had plenty of love and compassion for other people but hardly any for myself. I was on the way to work, and when I got there I went into the bathroom, looked myself in the mirror and promised myself from then on I would be there for myself. No matter what happened I would love myself and try to bring out the best in myself. It was a great decision.

  9. bikehikebabe says:

    I agree Albert. Practicing love & compassion for oneself, carries love & compassion to other people. Jean-you smart & lucky dog- You did that for yourself at mid-20’s. I “woke up” in my 60’s. I used to kick myself endlessly for mistakes, trying to improve.

    It lengthens your life to have a pet. I don’t. That’s why I bond with the neighbor dogs-“Three” (3 legs) and “Four”.

  10. cobewhice says:

    Hello!
    Nice site 😉
    Bye

  11. Jean says:

    cobewhice,
    🙂 Thanks for coming by!

  12. Bob says:

    Great article, i like it.

  13. Pauline says:

    Animals can certainly teach us a thing or two about love, but I feel it is more than this, they remind us of the way that we can love, that we can connect to our compassion, they remind us of our state of innocence that that help us heal and feel the divine. For me happiness is being in a state of love and compassion, and it means being in our highest united state, so whether it is the divine outside I can’t tell it is certainly the divine inside.

  14. Jean says:

    Pauline,
    I agree, there’s something about animals that do make me feel that connection. Thank you for coming by!

  15. Pauline says:

    It is a well known fact that elderly people do better when they have pets.
    the scientific explanation is that petting is a relaxing activity and it lowers blood pressure…
    I like your explanation a lot better

  16. Jean says:

    Pauline,
    I’ve read studies that people in nursing homes do better if they’re given a plant to care for. We need to be needed…to make a difference in this life.

    🙂 Thanks for coming by.

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