developing love and compassion brings forth the achievement of greater inner peace
Dalai Lama says that he has found that developing love and compassion brings forth the achievement of greater inner peace. Our well-being’s sense becomes great when we are concerned about other people’s happiness. When one cultivates a warm-hearted and close feeling towards others, their mind is usually at ease, which is a good way to eliminate an individual’s insecurities or fears. As a result, one is able to cope with hindrances that they are likely to come across. When one is compassionate, success is yielded, and their inner strength as well as serenity increases, and happiness is achieved. For example, when an individual is sick, and the doctor who is responsible for handling them has a warm human feeling, an individual feels at ease, and the desire of the physician to offer excellent care to the patients is curative itself regardless of the doctor’s skills. Identically, if a teacher becomes responsible in preparing their students for general life besides educating them academically, the pupils in question develop a trust and respect feeling which leaves lasting impressions about what they have learned in their minds (Lama).
We can learn to be compassionate by examining the state we are emotionally and eliminating compassion obstacles like hatred and anger. We should be able to control our feelings like anger, which can yield negativity hence affect our thirst for a loving mind’s happiness. We should train our minds to decrease the negative forces of anger and hatred, lest they continue hindering us from developing a quiet mind (Lama).
Cheri Maple, an American police officer, learned compassion during the first retreat she attended where Thich Hanh had held. At first, she thought she would listen to the teacher but not follow what he said because she thought it would be hard to practice compassion as a cop (Thich’s interview 14:18. During the retreat, she had a conversation with sister Chan Kang, about being a mindful officer, and she found her heartbreaking open, and it began to soften. Later after the talk, she realized it was possible to incorporate compassion and kindness in her work. She noticed that as her energy began to change, even that of the people around changed, including that of the people that she had been arresting (Thich’s interview 14.16-15.25). She had learned and begun practicing compassion as a police officer.
There are religious themes in Maya Angelou’s recitation covered by this week’s Buddhists. Love and compassion are the themes she talks about during her recitation. She says that love liberates and does not hold (Dr. Maya Angelou 0.13-0.15). She gives a story of how she had her baby at seventeen years were shown love by her mother. When it came time for her to leave her mother’s house after she had secured a job, the mother never restricted her. She set her free and liberated her to life and would always show her love whenever she came home (Dr. Angelou, 0.29-1.44). Her mother still showed love to her baby and made him food. Maya says that later her mother got sick, and she took her to her house to care for her, and she was able to liberate her when she got to the extremes the same way her mother had liberated her earlier on. Similarly, Dalai says that love and compassion yield happiness and that our need for love comes from the interdependence we share amongst ourselves. He says one cannot survive alone and that we all need each other (Lama).
There was a time I was in a conversation with my friend, who is a nutritionist and she was talking to me about the importance of taking plenty of water. She knew I was fond of not taking water, and during the conversation, there is this human feeling she spoke with that I even found myself taking notes. Since then, I follow the tips she gave me to the letter.