Quotes About Compassion

There's no denying that it takes effort to set the intention to see our fundamental connected-ness with others.

it's human nature to want to seize control when the people we love are suffering. But trying to impose our personal agenda on someone else's experience is the shadow side of love, while real love recognizes that life unfolds at its own pace.

If we stretch ourselves to open our minds, to see our shared humanity with others, we allow ourselves to see the existence of community and generosity in unexpected places.

Everyone Can Play is now the precept I live by. We may not agree with one another. We may argue. We may compete. But everybody gets to play, no matter what. We all deserve a shot at life.

May the actions that I take toward the good, toward understanding myself, toward being more peaceful be of benefit to all beings everywhere. And

When we truly allow ourselves to feel our own pain, over time it comes to seem less personal. We start to recognize that what we've perceived as our pain is, at a deeper level, the pain inherent in human existence.

Love is a living capacity within us that is always present, even when we don't sense it.

W]e're challenged daily to act lovingly on our own behalf. Simple gestures of respect—care of the body, rest for the mind, and beauty for the soul in the form of music and art or nature—are all ways of showing ourselves love.

Love is defined by difficult acts of human compassion & generosity.

There is no conflict between loving others deeply and living mindfully.

No matter what we think we should do, I don't think you can coerce yourself into loving your neighbor—or your boss—when you can't stand him. But if you try to understand your feelings of dislike with mindfulness and compassion, being sure not to forget self-compassion, you create the possibility for change.

Feelings of apathy as they relate to our relationships often stem from insufficiently paying attention to those around us.

When we identify the thoughts that keep us from seeing others as they truly are we prepare the ground for real love.

You don't have to love yourself unconditionally before you can give or receive real love.

Any time we find ourselves relying on the ideas of an absolute, frozen state of right and wrong—or fairness versus unfairness—that we are used to, we can compare the habit to distraction during meditation.

All beings want to be happy, yet so very few know how.

Without equanimity, we might give love to others only in an effort to bridge the inevitable and healthy space that always exists between two people.

But to take delight in our generosity helps us immeasurably in our spiritual practice.

The heart contracts when our bodies are overcome by shame.

To imagine the way we think is the singular causative agent of all we go through is to practice cruelty toward ourselves.

When we develop our ability to love in one realm, we simultaneously nourish our ability in others, as long as we remain open to the flow of insight and compassion.

A lack of real love for ourselves is one of the most constricting, painful conditions we can know.

if we really look at our actions with eyes of love, we see that our lives can be more straightforward, simpler, less sculpted by regret and fear, more in alignment with our deepest values.

How we traverse the space between us when conflict arises has a profound effect on the health and longevity of our relationships.