Copabanana
Well-Known Member
I have recently become aware of this term, radical compassion. Below I have cut and pasted a paragraph from Wikipedia which describes it.
I want to state why I have posted this thread here in failure to thrive.
I believe that those of us with children who are not thriving as others do or as we would want feel a great burden and a great isolation. Often we are blamed and looked down on by other people, as being in some way at fault. Unfortunately, too much we consider ourselves in this light as well. No matter how much we have fought for and succeeded in bringing resources to our children and in lighting their way, too often we blame ourselves for not having done more.
Worse still, we blame ourselves when others do not respond to our urgent efforts. We blame ourselves for both their indifference and their non-response. If we had done better, been better they would have responded to our great need and desire.
We blame the victim. Ourselves.
Caught between rocks and hard places, we are. Between the great love for our children...and non-responsive others....we go after ourselves.
This is the absolute worst thing we could do. For ourselves, for our children who need us, and for others...who must change.
I am of the Jewish faith. We believe that our responsibility as people is to bring our humanity to others and to the world. At the heart of our humanity is our suffering, as it is for every person alive, whether acknowledged or not. We cannot act and take for ourselves alone unless every other person in the world has for themselves too. I believe that is at the heart of all faiths, really, at least in the Judeo-Christian tradition.
So if I look at what I just wrote I see that it is my responsibility to be in my life not just one who has compassion but to be as to illuminate for others what it is to live in such a way. To me, that is what Lambert must have meant to say that radical compassion is the imperative to change reality in order to alleviate the pain of others. But first, I must change my own.
That is, I must learn to spare myself. First.
It is this belief, I believe, that is behind the campaign in the US of Bernie Sanders. (I am not taking a political position here.) I believe that Bernie Sanders is demonstrating this moral stance, of radical compassion. He is teaching us, at the very heart of his campaign, how to hold each other, and ourselves, in such a way that as to be human, in a profound sense. Note how he does not despair at loss or disappointment. He sees such as knowing reality and the essential first step to taking stock and taking heart. He knows that real compassion does not lie in fantasy or in turning away from the pain of others.
Or indeed, of turning away from the true pain and disappointment of our own lives. Sometimes, I think that is what the anger that is at the heart of our disappointment is--a turning away from hurt and pain.
For which we must feel compassion. First, for ourselves.
I believe the process which I have described above is at the heart of CD itself.
COPA
Radical compassion is a term coined by the philosopher Khen Lampert, in 2003.[1] His theory of radical compassion appeared in Traditions of Compassion: from Religious Duty to Social-Activism (2006).[2] Lampert identifies compassion as a special case of empathy, directed towards the "other's" distress. Radical compassion is a specific type of general compassion, which includes the inner imperative to change reality in order to alleviate the pain of others. This state of mind, according to Lampert's theory, is universal, and stands at the root of the historical cry for social change.
I want to state why I have posted this thread here in failure to thrive.
I believe that those of us with children who are not thriving as others do or as we would want feel a great burden and a great isolation. Often we are blamed and looked down on by other people, as being in some way at fault. Unfortunately, too much we consider ourselves in this light as well. No matter how much we have fought for and succeeded in bringing resources to our children and in lighting their way, too often we blame ourselves for not having done more.
Worse still, we blame ourselves when others do not respond to our urgent efforts. We blame ourselves for both their indifference and their non-response. If we had done better, been better they would have responded to our great need and desire.
We blame the victim. Ourselves.
Caught between rocks and hard places, we are. Between the great love for our children...and non-responsive others....we go after ourselves.
This is the absolute worst thing we could do. For ourselves, for our children who need us, and for others...who must change.
I am of the Jewish faith. We believe that our responsibility as people is to bring our humanity to others and to the world. At the heart of our humanity is our suffering, as it is for every person alive, whether acknowledged or not. We cannot act and take for ourselves alone unless every other person in the world has for themselves too. I believe that is at the heart of all faiths, really, at least in the Judeo-Christian tradition.
So if I look at what I just wrote I see that it is my responsibility to be in my life not just one who has compassion but to be as to illuminate for others what it is to live in such a way. To me, that is what Lambert must have meant to say that radical compassion is the imperative to change reality in order to alleviate the pain of others. But first, I must change my own.
That is, I must learn to spare myself. First.
It is this belief, I believe, that is behind the campaign in the US of Bernie Sanders. (I am not taking a political position here.) I believe that Bernie Sanders is demonstrating this moral stance, of radical compassion. He is teaching us, at the very heart of his campaign, how to hold each other, and ourselves, in such a way that as to be human, in a profound sense. Note how he does not despair at loss or disappointment. He sees such as knowing reality and the essential first step to taking stock and taking heart. He knows that real compassion does not lie in fantasy or in turning away from the pain of others.
Or indeed, of turning away from the true pain and disappointment of our own lives. Sometimes, I think that is what the anger that is at the heart of our disappointment is--a turning away from hurt and pain.
For which we must feel compassion. First, for ourselves.
I believe the process which I have described above is at the heart of CD itself.
COPA
Radical compassion is a term coined by the philosopher Khen Lampert, in 2003.[1] His theory of radical compassion appeared in Traditions of Compassion: from Religious Duty to Social-Activism (2006).[2] Lampert identifies compassion as a special case of empathy, directed towards the "other's" distress. Radical compassion is a specific type of general compassion, which includes the inner imperative to change reality in order to alleviate the pain of others. This state of mind, according to Lampert's theory, is universal, and stands at the root of the historical cry for social change.