In Buddhist religion, there is a term called "Karuna", compassion being its closest synonym in English.When we understand the true meaning of this word, we move closer to the very key to understand people.
A person can not be understood by staying where we are.To understand a person, we will need to reach out,offer a helping hand, put yourself in his shoes and try to feel his sorrows & experience his happiness.
When we do that, the answer to the question(which we all have asked at one point or the other), "How could he do it ? " suddenly becomes clear.
Needless to say, practicing "Karuna" is very difficult.When we are kids, we are not mature enough to understand it.When we grow up & are young, there are too many people around us to understand and we are always in a unexplainable hurry. Who has the time to be compassionate to so many people ? We pick some and we leave some, whoever is convenient to keep around is kept.Those who are difficult, are left behind.
As we grow old and are left with fewer people, then it becomes a lot easier to understand the meaning of "Karuna". But then only a few of us understand it since age and wisdom rarely go hand in hand.Nevertheless those who do become wiser with age, become more forgiving, and experience a rare sense of calm and peace.
Understanding people is a slow and painful process. We can not gain trust without trusting, we can't avoid being judged without being non-judgmental ourselves. We must be ready to make allowances, ready to become a little vulnerable.When we raise big walls around us, neither we see anyone nor anyone sees us.We take this risk of getting hurt with the people we love.They in turn do the same, believing that we will never hurt them, and when we do hurt each other, we have the belief that it was not what we meant to do. Faith is the key to any successful relationship.If we lose it, we lose each other.
If you haven't realized by now, we all can be accused of (at one point or the other) of hurting most the people we love the most. Maybe the assurance that they would not leave us has something to do with it. Mostly they suffer in silence, sometimes they tell us.But still they stay because when you love someone, you ought to accept the worst along with the best. There is no selection, only a peaceful acceptance of the person the way he is. You are aware of your own frailty and hence you accept their imperfections. We practice Karuna with people we care about, every single day, every single moment, because we know and we understand.. we understand.
A person can not be understood by staying where we are.To understand a person, we will need to reach out,offer a helping hand, put yourself in his shoes and try to feel his sorrows & experience his happiness.
When we do that, the answer to the question(which we all have asked at one point or the other), "How could he do it ? " suddenly becomes clear.
Needless to say, practicing "Karuna" is very difficult.When we are kids, we are not mature enough to understand it.When we grow up & are young, there are too many people around us to understand and we are always in a unexplainable hurry. Who has the time to be compassionate to so many people ? We pick some and we leave some, whoever is convenient to keep around is kept.Those who are difficult, are left behind.
As we grow old and are left with fewer people, then it becomes a lot easier to understand the meaning of "Karuna". But then only a few of us understand it since age and wisdom rarely go hand in hand.Nevertheless those who do become wiser with age, become more forgiving, and experience a rare sense of calm and peace.
Understanding people is a slow and painful process. We can not gain trust without trusting, we can't avoid being judged without being non-judgmental ourselves. We must be ready to make allowances, ready to become a little vulnerable.When we raise big walls around us, neither we see anyone nor anyone sees us.We take this risk of getting hurt with the people we love.They in turn do the same, believing that we will never hurt them, and when we do hurt each other, we have the belief that it was not what we meant to do. Faith is the key to any successful relationship.If we lose it, we lose each other.
If you haven't realized by now, we all can be accused of (at one point or the other) of hurting most the people we love the most. Maybe the assurance that they would not leave us has something to do with it. Mostly they suffer in silence, sometimes they tell us.But still they stay because when you love someone, you ought to accept the worst along with the best. There is no selection, only a peaceful acceptance of the person the way he is. You are aware of your own frailty and hence you accept their imperfections. We practice Karuna with people we care about, every single day, every single moment, because we know and we understand.. we understand.
