Compassion the antidot to suffering

Compassion and Self Compassion are one of the biggest teachings of your life and it will be a life long journey to truly understand and embody them. 
I do want to take a little bit of a different spin on it today. I was talking with someone this week and she asked me how I began to feel compassion for someone in my life who had really hurt me, and it made me really think… how exactly did that happen?

It was a couple of things,

1. My therapist made me realize that the only reason that I felt let down by her was my expectations about what she could provide for me. 
2. I had an intense breathwork experience that showed me what my this person was just a human, stumbling around the world, struggling, dealing with her own heartbreak, not having the tools to manage any of it. Yes, I had high expectations of her, but she didn’t have the resources to give me what I thought she should be able to give me. When I let my expectations of what she could provide me go, there was so much peace. 
3. Practice, I forgave her over and over again. It literally has taken years, I did Metta Meditation on her over and over again and I practiced self compassion when I was not feeling my best, or when I reacted to how she was behaving/treating me. I did every forgiveness practice in my tool belt and I felt all of my feelings. And there are some days that I still feel anger and I have to forgive and find compassion again.

So let me ask you, are your expectations of other people creating suffering in your life? Are your expectations creating an environment this is non-compassionate? If we had less expectations of ourself would we reduce our suffering? If we had no expectations of others, how could that change the game?

Here is the thing, we have a part we are playing in the story that is creating much of our suffering. And most of it has to do with expectations as well as lack of communication. Have we told people what we need from them? Have we told them directly, passive aggressively? Have we been specific? Or are we just sitting around hoping that they can read are minds and that they will act the way we want them to act in all scenarios?

How does this all play into compassion?

Well, our ability to be compassionate all has to do with our belief systems about it, and this is a part of examining those belief systems.

We also have to recognize that we are the only ones that can change the way that we are responding to people or ultimately living our lives. Can you have compassion for the other person? Is it causing you suffering? Are they causing you suffering, maybe it is time to evaluate that relationship?

I let a relationship go this year and as soon as I did, there was an almost instant relief and an understanding that that person was creating so much stress in my life, but I was also letting them. I was letting them cause stress by not communicating my needs, my expectations, all for fear of losing the relationship, well it deteriorated anyway, and I was left with only suffering. 

Notice where the stress and suffering is and see if it can be remedied by forgiveness, compassion, acceptance or letting go. Life is too short to hold onto anger. Read my blog post about forgiveness for more on this.